Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PETITION (COTTON INDUSTRY)

Mr. J. T. Price: With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, I rise to present a Petition on behalf of over 1,000 of my constituents resident in the small township of Horwich in Lancashire or working in the textile industry in that town.
The Petition re-emphasises the grave anxieties of Lancashire, as expressed in many similar Petitions submitted to this House in the present Session of Parliament assembled. It draws attention to the serious and continued decline in the textile manufacturing industry which was hitherto the mainstay of Lancashire and the cornerstone of Britain's commercial pre-eminence in the world.
It recites the circumstances in which the former export trade of this country has been eroded by foreign competition and in which the home trade has been detrimentally affected by the ever-increasing flow of cheap imports from Commonwealth and other countries where standards of living are low.
Your Petitioners complain that the prices at which such goods can be sold in this country represent unfair competition with which the Lancashire industry is unable to compete.
The Petition concludes:
Wherefore, your Petitioners pray that your Honourable House will take action without delay to limit the import of cheap textiles produced under unfair competitive conditions and will devote itself to saving the cotton towns of Lancashire from becoming derelict by taking prompt action to stimulate and revive the cotton industry.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.

To lie upon the Table.

Oral Answers to Questions — POST OFFICE

Stamps (Design)

Mr. Hector Hughes: asked the Postmaster-General if he is aware that each of the 10s., 5s. and 2s. 6d. stamps in Great Britain depicts a Royal castle beside the head of Her Majesty the Queen; and if he will authorise the issuing of a guinea stamp depicting the birthplace of Robert Burns beside the head of Her Majesty.

The Assistant Postmaster-General (Mr. Kenneth Thompson): The Answer to the first part of the Question is "Yes, Sir," and to the second part "No, Sir."

Mr. Hughes: Does not the Assistant Postmaster-General realise that that makes no contribution to artistic taste, that many realms in the British Commonwealth and various foreign countries show much more artistic taste in their selection, choice and design of postage stamps and that his regional stamps take not a step in that direction? Will the hon. Gentleman reconsider the Answer he has given and do something about it?

Mr. Thompson: I am not sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman is quite fair in his description of the new regional stamps which have, in fact, been received with a good deal of approval both in Scotland and elsewhere. I am sorry that I cannot add anything further to what I have already told the House about the use of stamps in this country for commemorating individuals.

Mr. Ross: If the Assistant Postmaster-General cannot commemorate the bicentenary of Robert Burns in this way, does he not think it a good idea to have a plaque of the Postmaster-General placed in St. Giles's Cathedral?

Offices, Stoke-on-Trent

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Postmaster-General what further consideration has been given to the Post Office facilities in the city of Stoke-on-Trent since the visit to the city of the Assistant Postmaster-General; what action is intended; and what are the future prospects, with special reference to the outlying new housing centres.

Mr. K. Thompson: Since my visit a new sub-post office has been opened in New-stead; a temporary one has been opened in Ubberley to serve until a new Crown Office building is completed; the public office at Tunstall has been rebuilt; and the delivery office at Longton extended. We intend to extend the public office at Longton, and both the public office and the sorting office at Burslem. We shall, of course, continue to keep a close watch on the needs of the new housing estates as they develop.

Mr. Ellis Smith: While I appreciate what has taken place since the Assistant Postmaster-General visited the city, will he bear in mind that we are very concerned about the lack of facilities at Meir and put that on record so that it can be given top priority?

Mr. Thompson: I do not think I am in any doubt at all about the opinion of hon. Members and others concerning these facilities at Meir. Our own inquiries, including those which I carried out personally, lead me to believe that the services at present provided are adequate by modern standards.

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Postmaster-General if he will make a statement on the prospect of a new central post office for the city of Stoke-on-Trent; when the new building will be completed; and whether he will ensure that all modern ideas are introduced and the conveying of mail bags is arranged by conveyors to and from the trains.

Mr. K. Thompson: Negotiations are well advanced for a new site in Station Road, across the road from the present Post Office building. We plan to provide new public office facilities, as well as a modern sorting office, a postal garage and workshop. Planning is still at an early stage, as is the study of the arrangements for conveying mails to and from the station. A definite timetable for the scheme cannot be fixed just yet.

Mr. Ellis Smith: Will the Assistant Postmaster-General bear in mind that we have been very patient and that I was promised this before the war? Having regard to that patience, will he now treat this as a matter of urgency and ask his right hon. Friend to view it as a pilot scheme and introduce all modern devices to make it the most efficient in the country?

Mr. Thompson: I am aware of the somewhat tortuous progress that these negotiations have followed over the years. I think that the hon. Gentleman knows most of the reasons for that. We will do all that we can to see that this office is brought into use as soon as possible and as efficiently as possible.

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Postmaster-General if he will arrange for full consultations between his staff, the Ministry of Works, British Railways and the city of Stoke-on-Trent so that the most modern layout possible shall be made for the area leased by British Railways and at present occupied by the Post Office, and the site to be taken over for the new central post office near Stoke station.

Mr. K. Thompson: Yes, Sir.

Christmas Traffic

Mr. Spriggs: asked the Postmaster-General if he will make a statement about the traffic dealt with by the Post Office during the Christmas period 1958; and how the figures vary, so far as St. Helens is concerned, in each department for the years 1955, 1956, 1957, and 1958.

Mr. K. Thompson: As the full answer contains rather a lot of figures, I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT. The broad picture is that letters and cards and telephone trunk calls were up this year and telegrams were down, both throughout the United Kingdom and St. Helens.

Mr. Spriggs: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that we appreciate the facilities which he gave for hon. Members of this House to visit their constituency post offices during the Christmas period? I should like, through the hon. Gentleman, to thank the postmaster at St. Helens and his staff for the good work which they have done for the people of St. Helens.

Mr. Thompson: I am grateful to the hon. Member for the expressions contained in his supplementary question.

Following are the figures:
It is estimated that 866 million letters and cards were posted in the United Kingdom during the busy period from 13th December to 2nd January as compared with 822 million the year before. The numbers posted at St. Helens for the Christmas periods 1955, 1956, 1957 and 1958 were 1·56 million, 1·64 million, 1·61 million and 1·63 million, respectively.


No reliable estimates can be given for parcels, but the figure for the country as a whole for Christmas 1958 is probably about 28½ million.
The estimated numbers of inland telegrams handled in the same periods were 857 thousand in 1958, and 906 thousand the previous year. The numbers accepted at St. Helens in 1955, 1956, 1957 and 1958 in the busy Christmas period were 1,445, 1,204, 913 and 805, respectively.
The estimated numbers of inland trunk calls made in the same periods were 21 million in 1958 and 19 million the previous year. The numbers made at St. Helens in 1955, 1956, 1957 and 1958 were 19·1, 27·4, 28·1 and 30·3 thousands, respectively. The increase of the 1956 figure over that for 1955 was in part due to a change in the arrangements for handling trunk calls in St. Helens exchange.

Portobello, Midlothian (Address)

Mr. Willis: asked the Postmaster-General what representations he received asking that the address Portobello, Midlothian, be changed; and what evidence he has received expressing satisfaction with the proposed new address.

Mr. K. Thompson: Ever since Portobello became part of the city of Edinburgh in 1896, there have been periodic requests for the name of the city to be included in its address. I have received letters welcoming the change, which has also been supported by letters in the Press: both the city corporation and the local post office advisory committee approve the change.

Mr. Willis: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that, in spite of what he says, there is very strong opposition to the loss of this historic name? Very few people think that it will add to the efficiency of the service, and the vast majority think that this is just another case of unnecessary Bumbledom.

Mr. Thompson: I have no reason whatever for thinking that that is a widely held opinion, and certainly it would be untrue if it were held in that form. There is no reason at all why the name Portobello should disappear. We would, in fact, rather welcome it if it appeared together with the district number of Edinburgh on the correspondence. There will be, in fact, an increase in efficiency and a saving in cost as a result.

Robert Burns Bicentenary

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Postmaster-General what new steps he is taking to enable the Post Office to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns.

Mr. K. Thompson: I am glad to be able to tell the hon. Member that special arrangements have been made to meet requests for mail posted in Alloway on 25th January to be postmarked "Alloway Ayr". People living away from the district may send under cover to the Head Postmaster, Head Post Office, Ayr, fully stamped and addressed envelopes for date-stamping and posting at Alloway on 25th January. The cover should be endorsed "Burns Bicentenary" and should be posted in time to arrive at Ayr by Saturday, 24th January. I hope the hon. Member will feel that we have tried to be as helpful as we could about the 200th anniversary of Robert Burns' birth.

Mr. Hughes: Is the Minister aware that this mean and miserable so-called commemoration is utterly inadequate, and would he, if he cannot publish a Burns stamp, allow us to use Russian stamps and send them to Alloway to be posted? Is he aware that his actions contrast very strongly with those of the United States Government and that the United States Information Service is telling us what Washington is doing about the Burns bicentenary? Is he not ashamed to come here with that paltry excuse?

Mr. Thompson: Thank goodness I am not answerable for what the United States postal authorities do. I do not intend to allow the provocative attitude of the hon. Gentleman to force me to withdraw this arrangement.

Residential Accommodation (Rents)

Mrs. Jeger: asked the Postmaster-General how many units of residential accommodation are owned by the Post Office; in how many cases the rent of the tenants has been increased; and what steps he, as landlord, has taken to ensure the satisfactory condition of the properties.

Mr. K. Thompson: Tenancies in residential accommodation owned or leased by the Post Office number about 1,000. In most cases increased rents become payable on 1st March next or at later dates. We have the whole question of the condition of these properties under discussion with the Ministry of Works, who act as our agent in this matter.

Mrs. Jeger: Can the hon. Member tell the House why his Department issues to tenants demands for rent increases


before ascertaining the condition of these properties? Is he aware that some of the properties in my constituency are in such a disgraceful condition that if they had been owned by a private landlord they would have been eligible for a certificate of disrepair? Why is he sheltering behind Crown immunity in this case?

Mr. Thompson: I have no desire to shelter behind anything. The issue of notices affecting the rents of all these properties, together with a great many owned by other Government Departments, was a very big operation. To have everything moving forward on a number of fronts at the same time is very complicated. Where we find that the condition of the property does not justify the rent increase, or where specific repairs are needed to put the property in good condition, then we will behave as a good landlord should.

Mrs. Jeger: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I beg to give notice that I will raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Oral Answers to Questions — TELEPHONE SERVICE

Rental Charges (Old People)

Mr. K. Robinson: asked the Postmaster-General if he will give consideration to the possibility of reducing telephone rental charges for old people who live alone.

Mr. K. Thompson: This suggestion has been considered sympathetically on various occasions, but singling out this group specially from among numbers similarly worthy and charging less than the standard prices for their telephone service could not be justified. As my right hon. Friend has said, the resulting short-fall in our revenue would have to be made good by higher charges to our other customers.

Mr. Robinson: Does not the Assistant Postmaster-General appreciate that to very many of these old people living alone the telephone is the only communication with the outside world, especially to those who find it difficult to get out and about? Does not the hon. Gentleman also appreciate that the cost of this concession would not be very large and that for these people the present rentals are prohibitive in many cases? Will he

not give further consideration to the matter?

Mr. Thompson: I do not dissent from a good deal of what the hon. Gentleman says. Unfortunately, what he says applies to other groups of people who suffer from age or infirmity of one kind or another, and the problem of drawing the line between the deserving and the not so deserving is a very difficult one indeed.

Accounts, Sheffield

Sir P. Roberts: asked the Postmaster-General what are the figures for receipts and outgoings, respectively, for the last convenient accounting period for the Sheffield telephone area.

Mr. K. Thompson: I regret that I cannot give these figures because accounts in detailed commercial form are not compiled for individual areas. Many costs are, for operational or accountancy reasons, met centrally.

Sir P. Roberts: Is my hon. Friend aware that in reply to rather similar Questions he said that he could not give the figures to the House because they were misleading? Is he not therefore trying to mislead the House now in not giving the figures? There must be some sort of accounting of telephone costs in Sheffield. I understand that they are very satisfactory. Cannot he now give them to the House?

Mr. Thompson: I am sure there is no ill-will in my hon. Friend's suggestion that I am attempting to mislead the House. Such figures as are available are incomplete and, in their present form, would be misleading.

Kiosks

Sir F. Medlicott: asked the Postmaster-General if, in relation to the new design for telephone kiosks, he will consider the possibility of incorporating in a prominent position in the upper part of each box, on at least two sides, the name of the village, township or district in which the kiosk is situated.

Mr. K. Thompson: My right hon. Friend is considering this matter and will write as soon as possible to the hon. Gentleman.

Sir F. Medlicott: Is my hon. Friend aware that many districts, especially villages and suburbs, are very anonymous at night and that a device such as is suggested would be of great help in enabling people, especially motorists, to know where they are and would also secure still further good will to his Department?

Mr. Thompson: These are among the considerations which we will take into account, but I must remind the House that there are some considerable arguments against the course proposed.

Oral Answers to Questions — TELEVISION

Forward Scatter Stations

Mr. Mason: asked the Postmaster-General if he is now able to make a statement of the dangers to operating personnel of the civil type forward scatter station; and whether a report has now been produced on this problem from the consultations that have taken place between his Department, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, and the Medical Research Council.

Mr. K. Thompson: Some time may elapse before final conclusions are reached as a result of the consultation to which the hon. Member refers. Meanwhile, I have assurances that, at the few civil stations in this country, precautions are taken to ensure that operating personnel are not exposed to high-frequency radiation in a way that might be dangerous.

Mr. Mason: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether the results of these consultations will be made public, and is he now absolutely certain that there are no dangers at all to the public emanating from this civil type forward scatter station?

Mr. Thompson: I have already answered a Question from the hon. Gentleman about any possible effects upon the public. This Question relates to the effects or possible effects on the operating personnel and my Answer is quite clear. I think that we had better await the report and consider what it contains before we decide whether or not to publish it.

Mr. Ness Edwards: As there is some apprehension about this matter, will the

hon. Gentleman say that as soon as the report is available he will make it available to the House?

Mr. Thompson: I do not want to give that undertaking until we know what is in the Report. There may be matters of considerable security importance which ought not to be published, and in that case we want to reserve our right to decide in the light of what is in the Report.

Mr. Ness Edwards: Do I understand from that reply that the hon. Gentleman will make known to the House any dangers that may be there which will affect the general public, without disclosing security arrangements?

Mr. Thompson: My right hon. Friend and I are always pleased to answer any Questions which are put on the Paper.

Advertisements

Mr. Mayhew: asked the Postmaster-General if he is aware that in the Independent Television Authority programme, "This Week," broadcast on 1st January, the remarks of the Chairman of the Federation of Wholesale and Multiple Bakers were interrupted in mid-sentence for the purpose of inserting advertisements; and if he will consult with the Independent Television Authority under Section 4 of the Television Act in order to devise methods of preventing the interruption of programmes by advertisements.

Mr. K. Thompson: The Authority tells me that there was no question of this speaker being interrupted in order to insert advertisements. On the other point raised by the hon. Member, my right hon. Friend sees no reason to intervene.

Mr. Mayhew: Is the hon. Member aware that the Authority's opinion is not shared by the victim himself who states —and many viewers agree—that he was interrupted on the word "and" in order to allow advertisements to be shown? Will the Minister say why this was? What is gained by allowing serious programmes of this kind to be interrupted in this way? It is not necessary for economic reasons. What is gained by it?

Mr. Thompson: I have been advised that Mr. Curtis, the gentleman in question, had no complaint to make at the


time, that he had finished the sentence on which he was engaged and that he was at a point at which the programme interviewer thought it right to pass on to the next subject. In those circumstances, I do not think that the hon. Member's judgment is necessarily the right one.

Mr. Hale: Will the hon. Gentleman bear in mind that I, having for the first time been able to pay a week's instalment on a television set, saw I.T.V. for the first time in the last few days and thought that the advertisements, although not very good, were quite the best part of the programme?

Mr. Mayhew: asked the Postmaster-General if he is aware that the broadcasting of the play, "The Bridge of San Luis Rey", on the Independent Television Authority programme on 6th January was twice interrupted, and then prematurely ended, by advertisements; and what arrangements he has made in his Department to ensure that the rules agreed by him with the Independent Television Authority in accordance with Schedule 2 of the Television Act are properly observed.

Mr. K. Thompson: The Authority tells me that the abrupt transition to advertisements at the end of the play, which was not itself prematurely ended, was due to an error of judgment, which is much regretted. It has been the subject of detailed investigation with a view to preventing any similar occurrence. Two stations only were concerned: the others cut out advertisements or faded out naturally. As regards advertisements during the play, the Authority is satisfied that these were inserted in natural breaks in accordance with the Second Schedule of the Television Act.

Mr. Mayhew: Is the Minister aware that this is the same kind of answer as we have been given to similar Questions of this kind on many previous occasions? Since the Authority shows itself quite incapable of exercising authority on this or other matters over the programme contractors, will he intervene and stiffen them up a little?

Mr. Thompson: Wild generalisations of that kind do not carry serious discussion of this matter any further. To some extent this is a matter of opinion as to what is or is not a natural break.
That is not in dispute at all. But I repeat what I said before: it is not necessarily the case that the hon. Member's opinion is the right one.

Mr. C. R. Hobson: Is the Minister aware that these are not wild accusations at all, that evidence has been laid before both the I.T.A. and himself and that, despite this, there is still no action taken against these breaches of the Act? Will he do something about it?

Mr. Thompson: If the hon. Member's question is designed to confine this discussion to the accusations which have been made in detail, such as that dealt with in the Question, the fact of the matter is that they number very few indeed. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] The hon. Member and his hon. Friends will have opportunities of checking on them in the future. The fact is that about 600 advertisements are sent out everyday and, out of that total, it is very rare indeed that we get this kind of specific complaint. When it happens, the Authority takes the kind of action which I have described.

Mr. Chapman: asked the Postmaster-General (1) whether, under Section 4 (4) of the Television Act, he will issue regulations defining more clearly the natural breaks which may be used for advertising;
(2) what consultation he has had with the Independent Television Authority under Section 4 (4) of the Television Act recently about definition of natural breaks which may be used for advertising.

Mr. K. Thompson: My right hon. Friend is not convinced that there is need at present to use his powers to define natural breaks. The Independent Television Authority, whose duty it is to secure that advertisements shall not be inserted otherwise than at the beginning or end of a programme or in natural breaks therein, assures me that its requirements are generally closely observed and firmly enforced.

Mr. Chapman: When the Television Bill was being discussed, were we not given to understand that natural breaks would be definite intervals, such as between the rounds of a boxing match? Does the hon. Member honestly think that at the time of the discussion of the


Bill anyone would have attempted to justify the kind of breaks which are used for advertising now? Is it not becoming a national scandal the way the spirit of the Act is being breached by this weak-Authority?

Mr. Thompson: I certainly cannot think that the Television Authority will be able to do its duty better by being subjected to this kind of abuse. This question was debated at great length in the House during the passage of the Television Bill, and I cannot accept any responsibility for the extent of the hon. Member's understanding.

Mr. Ness Edwards: Is not the hon. Member aware that very substantial assurances were given when we discussed this matter during the course of the Bill by the present Lord Chancellor? Is he not further aware that repeated complaints have been made on the Floor of the House? Is it not time that he told the Independent Television Authority that it is defaulting on its responsibility under the Act?

Mr. Thompson: The fact of the matter is that, apart from these occasional contributions from hon. Members opposite, the Authority itself and the Post Office receive very few complaints, if any, on this point.

Mr. Gower: Will my hon. Friend reject what is apparently the view of the Opposition—that this is the biggest single issue facing the country at present?

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL AIR FORCE

Rocket Bases (Security)

Mr. Hale: asked the Secretary of State for Air (1) to what extent he is now satisfied that the security arrangements in connection with the United Kingdom rocket firing bases are adequate to prevent knowledge of their location being acquired by a potential enemy and if he will make a statement;
(2) whether he will reconsider his decision to erect high security fences around land rocket bases in view of the fact that a security fence is an indication of the whereabouts of a high security base.

The Secretary of State for Air (Mr. George Ward): Any base of this kind must obviously become known in time,

but I am satisfied that this is no reason for publishing an official list of all of the sites.

Mr. Hale: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that I was not suggesting that he should publish an official list. I was supporting his desire to have secrecy. In view of the fact that the situation of many of these places is now published in every newspaper from The Times to the "Poultry Breeders' Weekly Gazette" and is known to the Nuclear Action Committee, I wondered whether there was not a possibility that some of these things might be translated into Russian and become known abroad. Ought not the right hon. Gentleman to preserve more strictly his undertaking not to let the House of Commons know where they are either by a statement from him or through the Press?
Turning to Question 19, does he not realise that there is the difficulty that if security fences are high they become noticeable and if they are low they do not give security?

Mr. Ward: The Government's position was made perfectly clear on this matter by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Defence on 24th February, 1958, when he said:
It would obviously not be in the public interest to disclose the number of missiles or the number of sites or their precise location."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th February, 1958; Vol. 583, c. 30.]
That is still the Government's position.

Mr. Hale: asked the Secretary of State for Air how many civilian police are at present employed at the secret rocket bases at North Pickenham and Watton, respectively.

Mr. Ward: None, Sir.

Mr. Hale: Does not that mean that the employment of a large collection of ordinary police in full police uniform in a small village in Norfolk gives some indication that something of a secret nature might be happening there? Would not the right hon. Gentleman consider the suggestion that when he has erected a high security fence he might deceive the public by putting a notice on the fence saying, "Police College, Norfolk, Air Ministry Property"?

Mr. Ward: I have already stated that there are no civil police there at present.


When we asked for their help the Norfolk Constabulary kindly came and helped us.

Malcolm Clubs

Mr. E. Fletcher: asked the Secretary of State for Air whether, in view of the concern felt among airmen at the threatened closing down of the Malcolm Club organisation, he will secure that these clubs continue to have every possible support from his Department.

Mr. Ward: I am afraid I cannot add to what I said in the course of the Adjournment debate on this subject on 18tn"December.

Mr. Fletcher: Is the Minister aware that what he said in the course of that debate has left the position in a most unsatisfactory and ambiguous state, and that since then there has been a further volume of protest in the Press and elsewhere against the closing of the Malcolm Clubs? Will he now give an assurance that there will be no Air Ministry objection to their continuing to function?

Mr. Ward: The assurance I gave during that debate still stands, that if the Malcolm Clubs can raise working capital and pay their debt at any time I will reconsider the decision.

Mr. de Freitas: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the Question which I asked during that debate and which he did not then answer, namely, whether the Air Council will give the same kind of direct and indirect assistance to the Malcolm Clubs as it gives to other voluntary organisations working on Air Force stations?

Mr. Ward: The clubs already get a subsidy of £30,000 a year, and that subsidy should be enough to enable them to fulfil their functions. It has nothing to do with what the others get.

Mr. Farey-Jones: Will my right hon. Friend give an undertaking at least to give careful consideration to the volume of opinions coming from all over the world, by the thousand, about the threatened closing of these clubs? Will he at least undertake to give the matter fresh consideration?

Mr. Ward: We have already very carefully considered all expressions of

opinion, and no one regrets more than the Air Council the necessity of closing these clubs.

Lady Tedder (Broadcast)

Mr. E. Fletcher: asked the Secretary of State for Air for what reason he ordered the cancellation of a broadcast to be given by Lady Tedder on 11th November over the Forces Network to Royal Air Force stations in Germany with regard to the work of the Malcolm Clubs.

Mr.Ward: No order was given for the cancellation of a broadcast by Lady Tedder.

Mr. Fletcher: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that I have seen the order made by the Air Ministry cancelling the broadcast? Is he aware that since that was cancelled by his Ministry a broadcast which Lord Tedder was going to give recently was also cancelled by the Ministry? Does the right hon. Gentleman not regard this action as a regrettable and arbitrary interference with the rights of very distinguished patrons of the Malcolm Clubs?

Mr. Ward: I disagree entirely with the hon. Gentleman. We asked Lady Tedder to submit the script so that we could have a look at it and see what she intended to say. This is a Forces Network run by the Army entirely for the benefit of the Forces there, and it is perfectly reasonable, particularly in view of the fact that we were going to debate this matter in the House shortly, that we should have asked to see what Lady Tedder was going to say. She preferred not to send us a script.

Mr. Shinwell: Do we understand that if the contents of a script do not happen to agree with the Minister's point of view the Ministry is entitled to prevent the views in that script being broadcast to members of the Air Force? By what right does the Ministry arrogate to itself that authority?

Mr. Ward: I did not say that was so. I said that we reserved the right to have a look at the script in matters which are as controversial as this. Where a very distinguished Marshal of the Royal Air Force is in conflict with the Air Council, I should have thought it not unreasonable to ask him to let us know what he proposed to say when speaking direct to the airmen over this Network.

Mr. Bevan: Do we now understand that our Forces abroad, naval, military and air, must now understand that whenever they are listening to broadcasts they are really listening to the command of the Army, Navy or Air Force?

Mr. Ward: This has nothing to do with the B.B.C.

Mr. Bevan: I did not mention the B.B.C.

Mr. Ward: It is run by the Army and it broadcasts directly to the airmen, and it is well known and accepted by the Army and the Air Force that in matters of controversy they should refer the script to higher authority.

Mr. Bevan: Does not that really mean that in this case the soldiers must feel that every time they are listening to a biased broadcast and the other point of view is not put at all? How much confidence does the right hon. Gentleman think the Forces will now place in these broadcasts?

Mr. Ward: The Army is responsible for these broadcasts.

Mr. Shinwell: Is it not true to say— and why does the right hon. Gentleman not come clean about these things—-that the only controversy in this matter is as between the monopoly of N.A.A.F.I. and opportunities given to voluntary organisations to cater for the welfare of the Services? Irrespective of the merits of this question, if Lord or Lady Tedder or anybody else wants to broadcast on the Forces Network in future, will the right hon. Gentleman assure us that he will not prevent them?

Mr. Ward: The right hon. Gentleman is not quite clear about the nature of the controversy. It has nothing at all to do with N.A.A.F.I. This is purely a financial matter, as I have explained already to the House in an Adjournment debate. On the second point, I still consider that it is not unreasonable if a very senior officer is in conflict with the Air Council on a matter of this kind that he should at least tell us what he proposes to say before he says it.

Mr. G. Brown: On that point, what did the right hon. Gentleman want to do with the script when he got it? Was it his intention to stop Lord or Lady Tedder making a speech if he did not like it?

Mr. Ward: Had I thought the script very highly controversial or criticising a Government or Air Force decision— [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]—I would certainly have asked Lord Tedder to reconsider making it.

Hon. Members: Resign.

Mr. J. Griffiths: Is it now clear from the reply given to the last supplementary question that the Minister has said that if a broadcast criticises the Government the Government will stop it being made?

Mr. Ward: I am sorry—the Air Council is what I said.

Mr. Bevan: Was it not only the other day that the House was given some information about senior members of the Services having differences of opinion among themselves about certain operations? There did not seem any objection at all to the Services quarrelling among themselves about a high question of strategy, but there appears to be something terrible about Lord Tedder disagreeing with the War Office about the future of the Malcolm Clubs? Why does the right hon. Gentleman not grow up?

Mr. Ward: This is a matter about which there were many Questions on the Order Paper and an Adjournment debate pending, and it was perfectly reasonable to ask what line Lord Tedder proposed to take.

Mr. Fletcher: On a point of order. In view of the very unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall take the earliest opportunity of raising this matter on the Adjournment.

Miss Lee: Further to that point of order. I beg to give notice that I shall take the earliest opportunity of drawing attention to the fact that Her Majesty's Government appear to take the view that the wives of senior officers are not persons in their own right but are necessarily merely megaphones for their husband's point of view.

Strike/Reconnaissance Aircraft

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Secretary of State for Air what is his estimate of the cost of the new supersonic bomber TSR2; and when it is likely to be in operational service.

Mr. G. Brown: asked the Secretary of State for Air approximately when the new strike/reconnaissance aircraft being developed for the Royal Air Force is expected to be ready for service; what will be its approximate cost; how many will be ordered; and how its performance will compare with existing similar types of aircraft such as, for example, the United States Republic F.105.

Mr. Ward: As I explained in a written answer to the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. de Freitas) on 17th December, it has been decided to develop a new strike/ reconnaissance aircraft as a replacement for the Canberra. The cost will depend upon negotiations between the Ministry of Supply and the contractors. We expect the aircraft to enter service during the mid-1960s. It would not be in the public interest to give the numbers likely to be ordered.
In the reconnaissance réle the TSR2 offers advantages over the F.105 and will also be able to operate from short improvised runways which the F.105 cannot use.

Mr. Hughes: Would not the Minister give an approximate guess of what this new venture is likely to cost? Will it be thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions of pounds? Can he also give us an assurance that the machine will not be obsolete before it starts to fly?

Mr. Ward: I can certainly give an assurance on that last point. On the first one, clearly it would be wrong to give any indication of cost while negotiations are going on between my right hon. Friend the Minister of Supply and the manufacturers.

Mr. Brown: Whilst congratulating the Secretary of State for Air on having scored this redoubtable victory over his colleague, may I ask if he does not think it proper to tell the House in what respect this plane, when it becomes available in the mid-60's or later 60's, will be superior to planes existing today? What will be the additional performance it is expected then to have? Secondly, is it not true that before the right hon. Gentleman decided on this, he must have formed some estimate of the cost of development? Ought he not to share this information with the House, which will ultimately have to authorise the expenditure?

Mr. Ward: I do not think it is for me at this stage to do that. That must come at a later stage, when negotiations are completed with the manufacturers. If it comes at all, it should come from my right hon. Friend the Minister of Supply. On the first point, the advantages that this aircraft will have over existing types is a greatly improved performance at all altitudes and ability to operate from very short runways, which is essential in the réle which this aircraft is primarily to fill, which is the support of the Army in the field.

Mr. Brown: Do I take it from that cautious reply that the right hon. Gentleman has very little knowledge of what the airplane will do, when it will be available or what it will cost?

Vulcan and Victor Bombers

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Secretary of State for Air what is his estimate of the cost of the latest Vulcan and Victor bombers.

Mr. Ward: It would be contrary to established practice to give precise figures, but in very general terms the cost of the aircraft now on order is likely to range between £700,000 and £1 million.

Mr. Hughes: Does not the Minister really think that, at a time when rockets are playing such an important part in the new type of warfare, these machines are now either obsolete or nearly obsolete, and is he not spending a large amount of public money without sufficient reason for it?

Mr. Ward: No, Sir. These aircraft are still, and will be for some time to come, the main part of the British deterrent.

AW.660 Aircraft

Mr. G. Brown: asked the Secretary of State for Air approximately how many AW.660 aircraft will be ordered for the Royal Air Force; whether they will be used to replace some of the existing variety of types of transport aircraft; and whether he will make a statement on Government policy for the future equipment of the Royal Air Force Transport Command.

Mr. Ward: The AW.660 is being ordered to supplement our existing transport aircraft. I am not at present in a


position to say how many may be ordered. The question of a strategic freighter is still being studied.

Mr. Brown: Is the Secretary of State setting a new record for decisions which he is not in a position to announce or say anything about? Having ordered this aircraft, surely he knows, and would he not like to tell the House, how many the Army will need the Air Force to operate to carry its provisions? Surely he would like to tell the House whether this will replace any existing aircraft? Cannot he tell us anything about it, or does he take all his decisions in a vacuum?

Mr. Ward: I have already said that this aircraft will supplement the existing aircraft in Transport Command. It will add to the already very considerable airlift capacity of Transport Command.

Mr. Brown: Then do I understand that the Valettas and the Hastings and all the rest will go on and on? Is there no policy on the part of Her Majesty's Government about R.A.F. Transport Command?

Mr. Ward: The right hon. Gentleman knows that the Beverley has still got a very useful life ahead of it. There is no reason to discard it at the moment. Eventually when it does become worn out it may be necessary to order some more of these to replace it, but for the time being this aircraft will be used to expand the lift of Transport Command.

Mr. Brown: Do I understand that all these decisions are being left for us to take when we take over?

Suez Operations (Aircraft Markings)

Mr. de Freitas: asked the Secretary of State for Air when it was decided to paint the wings of Royal Air Force aircraft used in the Suez operation with two yellow stripes on a black background; and how many are still so marked.

Mr. Ward: The Anglo-French plans for operations which might be undertaken in the Middle East to guard against dangers which might result from the nationalisation of the Suez Canal in July, 1956, provided that British and French aircraft used in any such operations should carry these special markings in addition to national markings. This is quite usual in a combined operation. The

special markings were put on R.A.F. aircraft on 30th October, 1956. They were removed as soon as the Suez operations were concluded. No R.A.F. aircraft still carry these markings.

Mr. de Freitas: Were not these markings those in use by the Israeli Air Force when they invaded Egypt, and is not this direct evidence of collusion between the Government and the Israelis?

Mr. Ward: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply he received from the Foreign Secretary on 19th December, 1956.

Mr. de Freitas: Will the Secretary of State for Air please look again at that reply and see if it is not direct evidence of passing the buck from one Department to another? Will he come clean on this, because it is an important matter?

Mr. Ward: The hon. Gentleman has already had an answer from the Foreign Secretary and I have absolutely no responsibility for the Israelis.

Mr. Bevan: With all respect, that is not the question that was asked. Were these markings used by the Israeli Air Force?

Mr. Ward: I have no knowledge of those facts—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Let me finish. Do not be so hurried. I have seen a picture in the Aeroplaneof an Israeli aircraft with these markings on it, but there is no question whatever of these markings being given to the Israeli Air Force by the United Kingdom.

Mr. Dudley Williams: Does not my right hon. Friend think that the colour of these alleged markings was much more appropriate to the conduct of Her Majesty's Opposition during the Suez operation?

Mr. Bevan: Whilst it may be correct that the markings which were used were not conveyed to the Israeli Air Force, did the Israeli Air Force convey to us what their markings were going to be?

Mr. Ward: As far as I know, no.

Island of Gan (Airfield)

Mr. P. Williams: asked the Secretary of State for Air whether he will make a statement on the progress being made in providing an airfield on the island of Gan.

Mr. Ward: Work on the Royal Air Force staging post is going ahead satisfactorily. Some of the domestic buildings cannot be started until arrangements have been made to move the islanders now living on the site, but this will not delay flying from the airfield.

Mr. Williams: In view of the importance of this airfield in Commonwealth relations, can my right hon. Friend give any estimate of when the work will be completed?

Mr. Ward: About the middle of the year.

Thor Missiles

Mr. G. Brown: asked the Secretary of State for Air, in view of the statement, a copy of which has been sent to him by the hon. Member for Belper, by the United States Ballistic Missile Division Commander responsible for the installation of Thor missiles in Great Britain, to the effect that the first Thor-equipped squadron would be fully ready in this country in February, and that a few missiles were expected to blow up on the stand, to what extent it remains the policy of Her Majesty's Government that such missiles delivered for use by the Royal Air Force shall be used for training purposes only; and what action he is taking to guard against missiles blowing up on the stand.

Mr. de Freitas: asked the Secretary of State for Air why he has accepted Thor missiles from the United States Air Force before they have passed satisfactory tests.

Mr. Ward: The missiles delivered to the R.A.F. up to date are for training purposes only. The trials taking place in America are proceeding most satisfactorily, and any modifications found necessary will be made before the weapons are passed for operational use.
The reference by General Schriever to rockets blowing up on the stand has been quoted out of context and referred to failures in the early research and development stage in America. No weapon of the type delivered to us has blown up on the stand.

Mr. Brown: I am relieved to hear that it has not blown up on the stand yet, but is the Secretary of State for Air aware that General Schriever in fact said, "Of course we expect to have a few missiles blown up on the stand"? He

was not referring to past performance but to future expectations. Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to take upon himself the guarantee that this will not happen?
The more important question I want to put is this: the right hon. Gentleman keeps on referring in this House to these missiles being for training purposes only. The American general responsible for their installation here has gone back home, has quoted the number—rather more than 60—as being established here, and has used the words "They will be fully ready by February". "Fully ready" must mean operationally, so does not the Minister feel he is beginning to be convicted of dissembling in this matter?

Mr. Ward: The only thing that is happening is that the right hon. Gentleman is convicting himself of not knowing what he is talking about. There are nothing like 60 here. Assembling means putting on their pads. There will be some ready on their pads in the middle of February, as the general said. Finally, there is no question of any danger of their blowing up on their pads.

Mr. Brown: I may well not know what I am talking about, unlike the right hon. Gentleman, but the American general, who should know, said that each squadron will have 15 missiles here by next month. The right hon. Gentleman has told us that there will be four squadrons. Apparently we are all incapable of making four times 15 into 60. Is the right hon. Gentleman now saying that the American general was stating an untruth in saying this? Why does the right hon. Gentleman keep on insisting that the missiles which are placed here are for training purposes only, when one cannot train with Thor missiles because the only place they can hit is America, unless one wants to hit Russia?

Mr. Ward: I find it impossible to believe that the American general said that 60 missiles would be here by next February.

Mr. Brown: He said 15 missiles per squadron.

Mr. Ward: The American general did not say they would be here by February.

Mr. Brown: Yes, he did.

Mr. Ward: I must look into that. If he did, he was absolutely wrong.

Forward Scatter Stations

Mr. Mason: asked the Secretary of State for Air what further steps have been taken to site the forward scatter stations required as a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation radio link with North America; and what estimate has been made of the power required in the high frequency beam.

Mr. Ward: These forward scatter stations are to be part of a N.A.T.O. communications system in Western Europe. Sites are still being considered. The power output will not be more than 10 kilowatts.

Mr. Mason: Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that the siting of these stations is most important and that the public should be aware of the siting of them as quickly as possible? Is he aware that Dr. Shinn, an authority on the health hazards emanating from powerful radar transmissions, has said that a 20 kW transmitter sited on level ground would be dangerous up to a radius of half a mile? Although the ones the right hon. Gentleman has mentioned may be less powerful, they are nevertheless a danger to the public and the public should know where they are to be sited.

Mr. Ward: As the hon. Gentleman acknowledges, these are only 10 kW stations and not 20 kW stations. I am assured that the location and design of the existing types are such that there is no danger whatever to the public, but, of course, the local authorities will be fully consulted as to the siting when the time comes.

Oral Answers to Questions — TRANSPORT

Road Accidents (Motor Cyclists)

Sir F. Medlicott: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation how many motor cyclists have been killed or severely injured on the roads in Great Britain during this year to the latest convenient date.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation (Mr. G. R. H. Nugent): Between 1st January and 30th November, 1958, 1,087 motor cyclists (including riders of mopeds) were killed on the roads, and 15,966 seriously injured.

Sir F. Medlicott: In view of the very heavy loss of life and injuries, particularly among young men, is further thought being given to the possibility of making the wearing of crash helmets compulsory?

Mr. Nugent: We think that the wearing of crash helmets is already spreading well throughout the motor-cycling fraternity and do not think it would be assisted by making it compulsory.

Motor Vehicles (Noise)

Sir F. Medlicott: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation if his attention has been drawn to the increasing noise caused in built-up areas by vehicular traffic, especially motor-cycles and sports cars; and if he is satisfied with the adequacy of the regulations concerning silencers.

Mr. Nugent: The noise problem and methods of dealing with it are continuously under study in our Department in conjunction with the other bodies concerned. The Motor Vehicles (Construction and Use) Regulations, 1955, contain provisions designed to prevent excessive noise from the exhausts of motor vehicles. Enforcement of the regulations is a matter for the police.

Sir F. Medlicott: Is my hon. Friend aware that this is a case where motor cyclists are the chief offenders? Is he satisfied that the regulations are being adequately enforced?

Mr. Nugent: I am not responsible for the enforcement of them. My hon. Friend must put that question to the Home Secretary. I can say that we are proceeding with research into the problem of noise to see whether some better regulations can be devised. We well realise the importance of this matter.

Car Parking

Mr. Ernest Davies: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation if he will state the amounts raised under car parking schemes to the latest available date that have been allocated to the provision of off-street parking in accordance with the provisions of the Road Traffic Act, 1956; and if he will list such car parks.

Mr. Nugent: Responsibility for the allocation of surplus revenues from car


parking schemes under the Road Traffic Act of 1956 rests with the local authorities concerned. One such scheme has been in operation in north-west Mayfair since 10th July, 1958. The surplus revenue cannot be computed until the end of the financial year, and Westminster City Council has not yet considered such allocation.

Mr. Davies: Does not the hon. Gentleman recall that when Parliament agreed to these parking schemes, which included the installation of parking meters and charging for parking on the highway, it did so only on condition that the money was used as speedily as possible for the provision of off-street parking? Is it not a fact that the full value of these parking schemes is not being realised as long as there is no parking off the streets?

Mr. Nugent: We certainly wish to see off-street parking schemes come along with the parking meter schemes, but it is for the local authority concerned when it has seen what revenue it gets to draw up its schemes to conform with the 1956 Act.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIVIL AVIATION

Air Transport Advisory Council

Mr. Beswick: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation to what extent he now proposes a change of policy in regard to revising and widening the terms of reference of the Air Transport Advisory Council; and if he will make a statement.

The Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation (Mr. Harold Watkinson): I do not intend to lay proposals to this end before Parliament in the current Session.

Mr. Beswick: What was the purpose of the right hon. Gentleman's reference in his speech at the Air Transport Independent Association dinner? Is he intending to give that organisation more facilities or not? Would it not be much better, instead of giving hints like this in public and promises in private, that he should make a clear indication of his intentions in Parliament?

Mr. Watkinson: I have given no hints in public and promises in private. I said that it would be a good thing that if all those who were interested discussed the

proposition that we should have a more broadly based licensing authority for the air. My suggestion seems to have been well received.

Mr. Beswick: Is it not a fact that the right hon. Gentleman has conveyed to the independent operators in private and by hints in public that he is preparing to give them greater facilities with regard to licences for new routes? Is he not aware that this produces a feeling of uncertainty among both the corporations and the employees of the corporations? Will he clear the matter up?

Mr. Watkinson: It might well do so if it were a fact, but it is not.

Prestwick Airport

Mr. Rankin: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation on what works the £2 million set aside for the reconstruction of Prestwick Airport will be spent.

Mr. Watkinson: The development of Prestwick Airport at an estimated cost of between £2 million and £3 million will include the extension of the main runway and associated taxi-track to about 9,800 feet; the provision of a new terminal area, including a new apron; the construction of a new control tower and fire station; and the diversion of the A.77 road.

Mr. Rankin: I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that reply, but can he not now give details of the expenditure on the various items? Can he say whether or not any sum is being reserved for the construction of an hotel at Prestwick, which is absolutely necessary?

Mr. Watkinson: If the hon. Gentleman, who takes a great interest in Prestwick, will put down a question about the details I will try to answer it. We have the hotel under consideration. As he knows, the Redbrae site is a much better one for an hotel than the other one.

Aircraft Accident, Southall (Inquiry)

Mr. N. Nicolson: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation if he is now in a position to state when the public inquiry into the crash of a Viking aircraft at Southall on 2nd September, 1958, is to be held; and if he will give


an assurance that this inquiry will be started immediately the result of the inquest is known so that all the relevant facts may be elicited before the question of whether other proceedings should be taken is decided.

Mr. Watkinson: There will be no avoidable delay in starting a public inquiry as soon as proper consideration has been given to the results of the inquest.

Mr. Nicolson: My right hon. Friend has been most helpful to the company which owns the aircraft, and I thank him for it. Has not an unusually long time been taken to complete the preliminary inquiries into this air crash? While I quite understand that he cannot comment on the coroner's three adjournments of the inquest, in general terms, would it not be a good thing to complete preliminary inquiries as soon as possible after a crash so that the company concerned can have an early opportunity to clear its name before a properly convened public inquiry?

Mr. Watkinson: My Ministry would very much like to hold its own inquiry as soon as possible, but as my hon. Friend knows, we cannot do so until the coroner has concluded his inquest.

Mr. Beswick: Does not the right hon. Gentleman agree that the situation created by the scope of the coroner's inquiry has made the matter most difficult? While we appreciate that neither he nor his colleagues has any power over the coroner, is it not possible to have some sort of inquiry and some sort of understanding so that this sort of situation does not arise again?

Mr. Watkinson: I am considering future procedures in air accidents, but it is very difficult when a coroner's inquiry has to be held first.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROADS

Birmingham-Preston Motorway

Mr. Swingler: asked the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation what alterations in the original line of the Birmingham-Preston motorway he has proposed since the line was agreed with the Staffordshire County Council in July, 1957; and for what reasons.

Mr. Nugent: There has been no change in the line of the motorway in Staffordshire from Dunston northwards, which was fixed by a scheme under the Special Roads Act on 30th June, 1958. It has been found necessary to re-investigate the line southwards from Dunston, and a number of possible variations to meet particular difficulties are being considered in consultation with the local authorities concerned. We hope later this year, in accordance with the provisions of the Special Roads Act, to publish a draft scheme showing and explaining the revised line.

Mr. Swingler: Is it a fact that the original line was agreed with the Staffordshire County Council on the basis of what was most efficient for modern practice? What particular conditions are being reconsidered now? Is it a fact that there is intervention from private property interests which is now liable to jeopardise the line of the road?

Mr. Nugent: Reconsideration has taken place in the light of the objections which we received to the line originally published, the possible engineering difficulties of mining subsidence on part of the line that we had originally considered, and the possibility of making a better line for the junction with the other motorways proposed to join in that area. We believe that in the light of all these circumstances a re-investigation is justified. When we have completed that we shall publish a further line, and we shall then hear whether or not there are objections to it.

BALLOT FOR NOTICES OF MOTIONS

Aged and Infirm Persons

Mr. Lipton: I beg to give notice that on Friday, 6th February, I shall call attention to the urgent need for improved services for aged and infirm persons and for a closer co-ordination of national and local services, and move a Resolution.

Fuel and Power (Policy)

Mr. Blyton: I beg to give notice that on Friday, 6th February, I shall call attention to the need for reconsideration of the nation's fuel and power policies, and move a Resolution.

Jodrell Bank Installations (Capital Allocation)

Mr. Winterbottom: I beg to give notice that on Friday, 6th February, I shall call attention to the need for an increased capital allocation by the Government to the Jodrell Bank installations, and move a Resolution.

BILLS PRESENTED

EUROPEAN MONETARY AGREEMENT

Bill to make certain provisions of a financial nature in connection with the operation of the European Monetary Agreement, and for purposes connected therewith, presented by the Chancellor of the Exchequer; supported by the Prime Minister, Mr. R. A. Butler, Sir David Eccles, Mr. Maudling, and Mr. Erroll; read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Monday next and to be printed. [Bill 58.]

MALTA (LETTERS PATENT)

Bill to remove the limitation of Her Majesty's power to revoke or amend the Malta (Constitution) Letters Patent, 1947, presented by Mr. Lennox-Boyd; supported by Mr. Julian Amery and Mr. T. G. D. Galbraith; read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Monday next and to be printed. [Bill 59.]

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Proceedings on Government Business exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[Mr. Heath.]

RESTRICTION OF OFFENSIVE WEAPONS

3.35 p.m.

Mr. Barnett Janner: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the law in relation to the making and disposing of flick knives and other dangerous weapons.
It is now about four years since I first raised this subject here, then by way of Questions. An increasing number of murders and stabbings with flick knives and similar weapons have taken place since then, and I have frequently endeavoured to rouse the Home Office out of its complacency, unfortunately, without success. The dangerous situation created in consequence of the inaction by the Home Secretary in this respect has been frequently commented upon by judges, magistrates, social workers and others.
For example, Mr. Justice Streatfeild, as far back as 14th November, 1957, at the York Assizes, said:
What an invention of the devil is the flick knife, which unhappily so often features in crimes of violence in this country often committed by young people. Personally I don't agree that there is any room for thankfulness or self-congratulation or complacency in that these articles are manufactured abroad.
The fact is that they are used over here all too frequently.
He went on:
Time was within my memory when the use of cold steel at an argument was regarded with contempt and described as being un-English, but unfortunately, as time has gone on, we can no longer point the finger of scorn and contempt upon certain foreign races of whom we used to think it was very typical. It is now the unhappy fact that very often it is our country men who use them.
I don't know how you feel about it, but one would have thought it was high time that Parliament considered either making the sale of these articles in this country altogether illegal or, at any rate, that they should be controlled by strict licence as firearms, or other dangerous weapons, because they are dangerous weapons and they should not be procurable by people who only want them to cut string.
The West London Magistrate, Mr. Barraclough, in a case heard on 3rd November, 1958, said:
It is absolutely scandalous that these things can be purchased by young men.
Mr. Justice Salmon also said:
The flick knife now appears to be regarded by teenagers as a badge of manhood.


A responsible journalist employed by the Star,who made inquiries quite recently, stated:
A youth of 17 in a street only a few yards from the spot in Holloway, where the policeman died, told me today: 'We carry knives for protection from other gangs. But many of the lads carry them for bravado'.
And this from a schoolboy of 14 in the same district:
' Many of the lads in our school have flick knives'.
As a police sergeant said: 'It's the fashion. A certain class of youngster thinks it's big to be able to flash a knife'".?
I have received support for my efforts to deal with this menace from a considerable number of individuals and public bodies, national and provincial newspapers in general and from the papers circulating in my constituency, the Leicester Mailand the Leicester Mercury,which have constantly expressed concern about the present position.
I remind the Home Secretary that the Association of Municipal Corporations, which has a comprehensive membership, has recently requested him to introduce legislation similar to that which prevails in the State of New York, in the United States, a matter to which I drew his attention several years ago. A similar request has come from the Women's Group of Public Welfare and Standing Conferences of Women's Organisations, which consists of representatives from 46 national women's organisations and other voluntary organisations with a large women membership.
It also includes representatives of all three political parties, of the Churches— Anglican, Roman Catholic, Free Church, and Jewish—and a wide variety of social service organisations. Recently such organisations as women's Co-operative organisations in various towns and the National Association of Youth Leaders and Organisers have given support to the idea of dealing with this very serious position.
I have just returned from the United States, where I made some inquiries about the legislation which prevails in the State of New York. I have tried to direct the attention of the Government to this legislation before. According to the American authorities it is effective, and most of the fears which have been expressed in the replies to Questions given

in this House with regard to the ineffectiveness of these Measures because of the use of these instruments by tradesmen are very much exaggerated; indeed, the American legislation reads as follows:
a person who offers, sells, loans, leases or gives to any person any knife which has a blade which opens automatically by hand pressure applied to a button, spring or other device in the handle of the knife, hereinafter referred to as a switchblade knife; a person who offers, sells, loans, leases or gives to any person any knife which has a blade which is released from the handle or sheath thereof by the force of gravity or the application of centrifugal force and which, when released, is locked in place by means of a button, spring, lever, or other device, hereinafter referred to as a gravity knife; … is guilty of a misdemeanour.
The question whether certain trades have to use these shocking instruments for certain purposes has been investigated by the American authorities, and at one time the legislation incorporated a provision exempting people who used these knives for trade purposes. But it has been found that that provision was not necessary and it has been removed. I think that the only way in which a person can now own one of these weapons is by being specifically licensed to do so. I am also told that shops have now stopped exhibiting these weapons, and that only those who are prepared to have proceedings taken against them still retain them.
I have received a letter, a part of which I think it would be useful to read, from a man whose son was killed by one of these weapons. He is a Mr. Gibson, who makes this appeal:
The incidence of crimes involving personal violence, and even death through stabbing with 'flick knives' and the like, in the hands of irresponsible youths and certain foreigners, when alone, and more often in gangs, prompts me to solicit your influence and that of any association within reach of your good offices, to so secure, that such offensive weapons are not imported nor manufactured and distributed for sale in this country.
The knives in question have no real practical use except the wicked purpose I have indicated —that of stabbing. The law has already provided severe penalties for persons carrying…offensive weapons, but left untouched the dealer who exposes for sale or sells them.
He concludes by saying:
…my motive in writing this appeal springs from a heart still grieving the loss of my only son. aged 21 years, who in June of this year was killed by being stabbed by such a knife as I have described"—
that was in 1957—


Nothing we can do can bring him back, that truth is obvious; but it seems to me some legislation at national level is demanded to protect the public and to combat this modern menace of recent origin, which is so un-British in character—meantime, many parents up and down the country remain worried and anxious.
There is much that I could say, but it will have to be left for a later stage.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Janner, Mr. Chapman, Mr. Sydney Irving, Mr. Prentice, Mr. Wade, Mr. Eric Johnson, Mr. George Jeger, Mr. Marcus Lipton, and Miss Joan Vickers.

RESTRICTION OF OFFENSIVE WEAPONS

Bill to amend the law in relation to the making and disposing of flick knives and other dangerous weapons, presented accordingly and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Friday, 20th February, and to be printed. [Bill 60.]

Orders of the Day — AGRICULTURE (SMALL FARMERS) BILL

Order for consideration, as amended (in the Standing Committee), read.
Bill recommitted to a Committee of the whole House in respect of the Amendment to Clause 1, page 1, line 20, standing on the Notice Paper in the name of Mr. Thomas Williams, and the Amendments to Clause 3, page 3, lines 16 and 21, standing on the Notice Paper in the name of Mr. Thomas Fraser.— [Mr. Willey.]

Bill immediately considered in Committee.

[Sir CHARLES MACANDREW in the Chair]

Clause 1.—(SCHEMES FOR GRANTS FOR INCREASING EFFICIENCY OF SMALL FARM BUSINESSES.)

3.48 p.m.

Mr. Thomas Williams (Don Valley): I beg to move, in page 1, line 20, at the end to insert:
Provided that where an application under the scheme is made jointly by several persons and the Minister is satisfied such persons will carry out their trades or businesses by co-operating in a manner approved by the Minister such trades or businesses shall be deemed to be a single farm for the purposes of the scheme.
In Committee, the right hon. Gentleman was very sympathetic towards a similar Amendment which we then moved. Neither he nor we were satisfied whether or not the Bill gave effect to the point we had in mind, and we are giving him another opportunity to tell us whether he thinks that the terms of the Bill will allow co-operation and amalgamation schemes to qualify as single farm business schemes.
It might be as well to let hon. Members on both sides of the House know why we feel that the Amendment is necessary. Paragraph 18 of the White Paper states that in the United Kingdom there are about 500,000 holdings varying in size from one acre up to the largest, and that of those 500,000 about 300,000 are what could be termed farm businesses. It further states that of those 300,000 about two-thirds will fail to qualify, either because of their size or because of their efficiency; that of the remainder about 65,000 comparatively small farms, of between 20 and 100 acres, may qualify for a grant for a farm business, and that a further 25,000 would probably qualify for


some sort of income under the supplementary scheme.
That deals with 300,000 out of the 500,000 holdings, leaving about 200,000 smaller holdings—some of them part-time and some hobby farms, or whatever they may be called—which are not likely to qualify under either one or the other of these schemes. We are anxious that, where it should be possible for two or more small adjoining units to be able to co-operate or amalgamate, these two or three units, if they do amalgamate, should qualify for a grant under the Bill.
The right hon. Gentleman told us that it was a difficult Bill, and we agree with him. We know that there are borderline cases whatever size of unit may be fixed. Whether it be 20 acres as the limit downwards or 100 acres as the limit upwards, whether it is 250 man-days per year, 275 man-days or whatever it is, there will be some above and some below, and we do not blame the right hon. Gentleman for that. What we are anxious about is that 200,000, or a very large portion of the 200,000, will not only not be able to benefit in any sense under the terms of this Bill, but will actually have to contribute to the 65,000 who do benefit, if that number actually does qualify for farm business schemes.
We think, therefore—because the right hon. Gentleman, as well as we ourselves, disagrees with compulsory amalgamations —that we ought not to miss an opportunity of encouraging co-operation or amalgamation wherever that should be possible, and this seems to me to be possibly the best chance of amalgamating a number of small units which we have had for a long time.
I wish now to quote from the OFFICIAL REPORT of the Standing Committee. On 2nd December, 1958, in col. 104, the right hon. Gentleman said:
There is nothing at all, under the Bill as drafted or the intention I have in mind, to prevent a number of people—one or two or even three—coming together to work out a joint plan and, so to speak, amalgamating those two or three farms for the purpose of farming under one common plan and qualifying under the small fanners scheme.
It is clear that the right hon. Gentleman is not unsympathetic to the idea. It is clear that he has been advised that, under the terms of the Bill as it now stands, co-operation and amalgamation could qualify for a grant, but, in the next

column of the OFFICIAL REPORT to that from which I have just quoted, the right hon. Gentleman said that he saw nothing in the Bill that would prevent amalgamations of that kind. In the following column, the right hon. Gentleman argued that the word "person" for this purpose means "persons". Probably, his advisers were right; I do not know. Finally, in column 116, the right hon. Gentleman said:
This has been a useful discussion, and I will see whether or not what I have said is correct, that the Bill carries out that intention. If I am satisfied that it does as drafted, I will say so at a later stage. I am sure that hon. Members would not wish to repeat something which is already in the Bill."— [OFFICIAL REPORT,Standing Committee A,2nd December, 1958; c. 104 and 116.]
I move this Amendment to give the right hon. Gentleman the opportunity of persuading us that his intention—and we give him full credit for it—as well as ours, is to provide the necessary encouragement, and let it be known that the encouragement is there, for such co-operation and amalgamation as may take place under the terms of the Bill. I do not think that this is the best Bill in the world, but, for what it is, at least we ought to make the best of it. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will, therefore, tell us what further information he has and whether or not it would not be better to include in the Bill the words proposed by the Amendment, so that all and sundry would see not only what the intentions of the Minister were, but also, perhaps, how their friends, relatives or neighbours could benefit as a result of the Bill.
I hope it will not be forgotten by any hon. Member that there are 200,000 occupants of small areas of land—maybe part-time, maybe hobby farms, or what we will—who, in the interests of food production and of reducing the hostility which is bound to face the Minister, no matter how many pats on the back he may receive from the 65,000 who benefit —he will not get any from the 150,000 who get nothing, but who will have to contribute to the other 65,000 who do benefit—should be able to see clearly that that intention is embodied in the Bill and will be faithfully carried out when the scheme arrives, and that ultimately nobody will be disappointed in carrying out these amalgamations, but that the opportunity is provided for them if they wish to do so.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. John Hare): I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) for giving me this chance of repeating the assurance which I gave in Committee, and I am glad to be able to inform the Committee that what I said upstairs was correct—that the word "person" means "persons". In fact, the very thing which the right hon. Gentleman and right hon. and hon. Members on that side of the Committee wanted, and which my right hon. and hon. Friends on this side also want, will be effected by the Bill as drafted now. It will do precisely what the right hon. Gentleman wants. It will enable two or three farmers, if they wish, to combine their businesses to form a single farm business, and, as long as they qualify within the standards laid down of minimum acreage and the upper limit of 450 standard man-days, they will qualify within the general compass of the scheme.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman a question? He will remember that in Committee we quoted the case of Lord Stonehaven, who has 20 farms. How does that statement cover his case?

Mr. Hare: This is hardly amalgamation, but if Lord Stonehaven, or anybody else, had two or three small farms, so long as they did not exceed the 450 standard man-days, and they were to be amalgamated, they would qualify under the Bill as it now stands.
I think that, although obviously the number of such amalgamated units will be limited by what I have just said about standard man-days, it will form an important by-product in that it will create a number of voluntary amalgamations, which I believe right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the Committee want to see.

Mr. F. H. Hayman: Will the Minister say whether such an amalgamation will make it necessary for there to be a legal partnership agreement?

Mr. Hare: I should say that it would probably be wiser to have a legal partnership, but the two or three parties concerned would have to satisfy my officials that that was their intention, and that they were, in fact, going to carry out

these two or three businesses as one single unit.
There is another point which I should like to make about another form of cooperation that can be encouraged under the Bill. It is my hope that neighbouring small farmers, each preparing programmes for improvements in their farm businesses, may find that they need, as part of their programme, to share in some rather expensive equipment. If they wish to do that, I would hope that they would get together and form a machinery syndicate; and here the farm business grant would help them to find their share of the cost of that machinery syndicate. This might well be an economical way of improving the farming business. My advisory officers are being instructed to advise on any proposals of that sort which come forward as part of a small farm improvement programme.
4.0 p.m.
To set out what Members on both sides of the Committee felt about this matter I issued only last week a new pamphlet for circulation to all fanners. I explain in paragraphs 27 and 29 of it the form of part-time farming, partnerships and co-operation. I hope it will make clear any doubts there may be in our debates. I appreciate that these points were brought forward as the result of our very useful Committee discussions.

Mr. Eric Fletcher: Will copies of the document be available in the Vote Office to hon. Members?

Mr. Hare: The pamphlets are being sent out to farmers, but I shall be very pleased to make copies of them available in the Vote Office.

Mr. Fletcher: It is difficult for hon. Members to follow what is happening unless we can see whether the instructions sent out to farmers correspond with the terms of the Bill.

Mr. Hare: I am sure that the hon. Member would not wish to be discourteous in any way. I am now reaffirming that all the things I said in Committee—of which the hon. Gentleman was not a member—were correct. The pamphlet is a further piece of assistance to farmers to show that what was said in Committee can be interpreted


in the normal way by recipients under the scheme.
Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman's Amendment could be withdrawn. I do not think it is in the mind of the right hon. Gentleman that we should go wider than I have suggested. It would be wrong for us to accept applications from groups of farmers who are co-operating in certain matters but have not put all their farm business into a common pool. I gave instances in Committee of two or three men joining together and running stock on a pool basis, but still carrying on other work as individuals. There would be danger in that, because it would break the principle of our scheme, which is to give assistance to viable units. We have described what we mean by "viable".
I would express my thanks to the right hon. Gentleman and hope that he might now think fit to withdraw the Amendment.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: We should have some explanation from Scottish Ministers about the administration of the Bill in Scotland. The noble Lord the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland will remember that I raised this question in the Committee. There was an attempt to clarify the point, but it was not very successful.
We have protested strongly at the way that Scotland is being used as a sort of tin can behind the English dog. Over and over again we have found that Scottish provisions have been incorporated in an English Bill although the law of property in the two countries is in many respects different. I was, therefore, interested to see in today's Scotsmanthat the kind of protest that we have been making all along has powerful support from the Central Federation of Landowners in Scotland.
I do not think that we should allow Scotland to be shoved aside by an explanation from an English Minister on any occasion, when we have a separate Department. I see that the Secretary of State for Scotland is present with powerful reinforcements, which I assure him will be very much needed. We shall attempt to get the Scottish position clarified.
How is the Bill likely to be operated? That question already greatly concerns farmers throughout Scotland. The Bill has been called, and, I think, rightly so, by the organ of the National Farmers' Union of Scotland, a "body blow to Scotland". The Amendment proposes that there shall be opportunity for cooperation and agreement among particular farmers who might not otherwise be eligible for grant under the Bill. This applies to my own part of Britain, and especially to the constituency adjoining mine, which is, unfortunately, not at present represented in the House owing to the death, which we all regret very much, of the former Member for Galloway, Mr. Mackie.
There is to be a by-election in that agricultural constituency, and it is interesting to note that farmers there are asking pertinent questions about how the Bill is likely to operate. Why do the Secretary of State and the noble Lord the Joint Under-Secretary of State reject the Amendment? In the recent protest organised by the National Farmers' Union an extremely important speech was made by a farmer in Galloway. That gentleman, Mr. Ian Jennings, is a well-known and representative farmer in that part of Scotland. He cited cases of small farms in his own parish and he estimated that of the 25 marginal farms three would be eligible under the Government's proposals, two were doubtful and 18 were not eligible at all. Mr. Jennings analysed the number of small farms in that corner of Scotland in the Galloway area and came to the conclusion that only one quarter of them would be eligible for grant at all.
If two of those farmers decided to come together and co-operate, and then apply for a grant which they would not get individually, how sympathetic would the noble Lord be towards those applications? The number of farms affected in Galloway is very substantial; could the noble Lord assure us that he would look sympathetically on applications from one, two or three small farmers who would qualify for grant? If he would not do so, he would make the situation in that part of Scotland very difficult indeed. There are special circumstances affecting the south-west corner of Scotland as well as the northern parts. The noble Lord or the Secretary of State should explain why they reject the Amendment.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Lord John Hope): The answer to the hon. Gentleman's plea is that I will, of course, look sympathetically at any request that is made to me, as I hope I always do. That does not in the least mean that I am bound to accede to it. The hon. Gentleman is asking me to look sympathetically at any request—that is all he can do—and that I will do. The yardstick laid down by my right hon. Friend the Minister applies to partnerships in Scotland as in England. There is no need for me to repeat his arguments, which apply in our case. Galloway can be no exception, because it comes into it just as much as does anywhere else in Scotland.

Mr. R. T. Paget: I understand that the object of this Amendment is to enable more people to get grants. If that be the idea, I am against it. I feel that the fewer people who get these grants the better.
These grants come from the farmers' incomes. We have the Government making grants, not out of their own pockets, but out of the farmers' incomes. Those are capital grants which they recognise as to be so economically worthless that it is no use offering them to the farmers, who will use them as anything except a free gift because they would not dream of being silly enough to accept them as interest-free loans. The staggering thing is that the National Farmers' Union leadership did not seem to tumble to this swindle. Their income is being attacked in order to be compulsorily used for capital grants which could not earn an income, or at least which the recipients did not think would earn a sufficient income, to make it worth while on the basis of an interest-free loan.
The rank and file of the borrowers have at last tumbled to this and they wish to oppose the Bill. I only hope that the Labour Party will not be behind the rank and file of the farmers, but will vote against this Bill on the Third Reading.

Mr. Frederick Willey: I intervene only because this was a matter which was discussed in Committee and I want to take the opportunity of saying to the Minister at once that we recognise that in some measure he has narrowed the gap. Quite frankly, however, I still feel there is a fundamental

difference between us. I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for calling attention to the circular which is being issued, and which will encourage co-operation. I am obliged to him for the steps he is taking about machinery syndicates, but he will realise that this does not answer the points we are making by this Amendment, because each member of the machinery syndicate will be judged on his own merits as a single farm business.
I recognise, also, that we are agreed about voluntary amalgamations and partnerships. We wish to encourage voluntary amalgamation and we have no objection at all to a development of partnerships among small farmers, but the right hon. Gentleman will realise that this does not really meet the point we made in Standing Committee. The right hon. Gentleman will not, I think, disagree if I say that, to satisfy him, the small farmers would have to merge the whole of their farms into a single business. We said in Standing Committee, and say once again, that we think the Minister should have powers to deal with other forms of co-operation.
I say at once that there is a difference of emphasis between the two sides of the Committee on co-operation in farming. I think that there is a much greater emphasis on co-operation on this side of the Committee. That is why we regard the Amendment as one of substantial importance. I would remind the Minister that it seeks merely to provide him with permissive powers. We are not seeking to place any obligation on his shoulders. We are saying that we recognise the need to endeavour to encourage voluntary amalgamations and to encourage partnerships, but here we are dealing with very rugged individuals who will not easily accept the idea either of amalgamation or partnership.
We believe that the Minister has the opportunity, under the provisions of the Bill, to encourage and to use the services of the N.A.A.S. to encourage co-operation. For that reason, I beg the Minister to accept the Amendment. We give him credit for going so far on the way to meet us, but we feel that this is an important matter and the machinery is provided here for encouraging co-operation. The Minister ought to have discretion to decide in particular cases that the cooperation is sufficient and effective enough


to be recognised for the purposes of this Bill.
We have said, and I repeat, that the Bill provides for safeguards and conditions. We ask the Minister to take no more than permissive discretionary powers. I hope, therefore, that as there is no difference of principle but a difference of emphasis, the Minister will accept the Amendment. If he does not accept it, we shall have no alternative but to take the matter to a Division.

Sir John Barlow: A small point arises out of this debate to which I wish to call attention. As I understand, we have been dealing with the case of two or more small farmers joining together to qualify for this grant. I wish to ask what is allowable in a reverse direction? Suppose a farmer has a much larger farm than is necessary for such a grant and divides it, either with his wife, or his wife and children, or, possibly, as each child attains its majority, he takes off 20, 30 or 50 acres, which is the appropriate size to qualify. Can the farmer fragment his farm among his family or friends in order to qualify?

4.15 p.m.

Mr. E. G. Gooch: The desirability of some forms of cooperation was mentioned during the Committee stage and I had every hope that the Minister would have carried the matter a little further than he has done today. Even at this late hour I hope he will change his mind about the Amendment. The absence of reference to cooperation in the Bill, earlier, cut out a lot of small men who otherwise would be in a position to qualify. I accept the word of the Minister about the possibilities under the Bill as it stands, but I think he might have another look at the Amendment.
I wish to refer to the document issued by the Ministry. In the section dealing with co-operation, on page 3, that document says:
an eligible small farmer who considers that he could increase the efficiency of his farm business if he were able to use an item of machinery or equipment that he could not afford to acquire outright, may well wish to form or to join a co-operative machinery syndicate.
That is very encouraging and is the next best thing to accepting the Amendment,

but I want to know from the Minister, who will be made responsible for forming the syndicates, who will take charge of the running of the syndicates? It is impossible to expect small farmers to give their time and attention to running syndicates in which money is involved. If the Minister could carry the matter a little further, I should be very much obliged.

Mr. Harold Davies: I hope that the Minister will be able to concede this Amendment. He was most courteous to us during the Committee stage. I wish someone had thought of distributing the document referred to through the Vote Office, so that we could have had an intelligent grasp of the Amendment in relation to the latest information sent to farmers. I therefore hope that the Minister will at least send copies of the document to hon. Members of the Committee and, if possible, to all hon. Members.
The Government had an excellent opportunity here of increasing agricultural co-operative associations. The membership of such associations since 1946 has been a staggering demonstration of the desire of small farmers to make their farms economic and viable. The membership in 1946 was 98,765. Last year it was 230,687. That is a terrific growth. If the right hon. Gentleman accepts the Amendment he will have a chance of encouraging this kind of cooperation. The turnover of the associations has increased in the same period from £23 million to £129 million. That is a contribution to the country. As has been pointed out, the snag in the Bill is being observed by the farming fraternity.
It will cost £6 million to put the provisions of the Bill into effect. The"64 dollar question" is: where is the original £6 million coming from? It is coming out of the income of the farming fraternity. It is agreed that this £6 million will stimulate another £3 million or £4 million in further grants to small farmers. If we encouraged co-operation I think that the financial burden on the farming fraternity would be less.
It is an interesting fact that in North Staffordshire there are 1,710 small farms of under 20 acres. In my constituency there are nearly 1,340. Those farmers in Leek will get nothing unless there is


some kind of co-operation and encouragement in that hill district. How are we to expect them to draw up that co-operation? Those farmers work morning, noon and night and have not the time to work on legal articles of association. So long as the Ministry's inspector or the National Agricultural Advisory Service advises that there is no skulduggery or humbug about an amalgamation, that should be sufficient without legal articles of association. Many of these people would have to hand over money to lawyers—I apologise to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget)—to obtain those articles of association. The Minister could set an example by allowing association by charter rather than by script.
On the question of amalgamation, we have to protect the Minister of Agriculture as well as the farmer. Could farmer A, living 20 miles away, amalgamate with farmer B? Do the terms of the Bill mean that farms must be contiguous, or reasonably near together, to amalgamate? There may be a farmer with under 20 acres in Lincolnshire who wished to link with his brother who had a small farm in Merionethshire. Protection must be provided against that kind of thing. Consequently, I ask if farms must be contiguous or at a reasonable distance from each other so that machinery and other types of co-operation may be reasonably facilitated? I sincerely hope that the Minister will give this chance of voluntary co-operation by accepting the Amendment.

Mr. E. Fletcher: I have no doubt whatever that if effect is to be given to the intentions which the Minister has expressed, it will be necessary for the Committee to accept this Amendment, for the reasons given by my hon. Friends. I do not believe that the Minister went any way to meet the case that was presented to him in Standing Committee. I was not a member of that Committee, but that was no fault of mine. I think it is useful that it has been decided to recommit this Amendment to a Committee of the whole House because it enables those of us who were not on the Standing Committee to apply our minds to an important matter, and what to me is a puzzling matter in spite of the Minister's explanation.
I am very glad that in the course of his remarks the Minister referred to this document which has been issued by the Ministry. I was a little suspicious when I heard him refer to it, and I have become even more suspicious since I had an opportunity of reading it, thanks to the courtesy of my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, North (Mr. Gooch). I do not think that the document does what the right hon. Gentleman told the Committee it does. It seems to me to do exactly the reverse. It is important that the Committee should know what this document says. We are asking that there should be written into the terms of the Bill an express specific provision enabling small farm owners who do not qualify for assistance to join together so that they may become eligible to rank for assistance.
We have heard during the course of the Minister's remarks references to some very ambiguous matters. He referred to a partnership, to an association and to a syndicate. If my hon. Friend the Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) will allow me to say so, I have the greatest sympathy with what he said. It is most undesirable that small farm owners should be subjected to the necessity of getting legal assistance to enable them either to understand the document or to comply with its provisions.
There is an important paragraph in this document which, unfortunately, the Minister did not read to the Committee and it is important that the Committee should know about it. There are two relevant paragraphs, the first one of which is headed "Partnerships" and the next "Co-operation." The paragraph headed "Partnerships" says this:
If two or more small farmers have hitherto run separate farm businesses too small to be eligible for assistance, they may form a partnership and in that case an application can be accepted from the partnership in respect of the new combined farm business if that is within the limits of eligibility.
No one has any quarrel with that. That is what we would have expected. It is always open to any two small farmers to combine and form a partnership. So far, so good. But that is not what we are concerned with in this Amendment. We are concerned to enable two small farmers, who, for very good reasons, do not want to amalgamate and form a formal partnership, to get the benefit of assistance under the Bill and join together in


what the Minister suggested was less than a partnership—namely co-operation.
The document goes on to say this:
Forms of co-operation (short of a full partnership) among a group of farmers, each of whom taken individually does not satisfy the conditions of eligibility, cannot make the group as a whole eligible for assistance.
Would the Committee have dreamed from what the Minister said that that was the effect of this document? We expect a certain amount of candour in this matter when a Bill of this kind comes back for consideration. The document to which the Minister has referred expressly says that forms of co-operation among two or more farmers not amounting to a full partnership will not make them eligible for assistance. That is the reverse of what he told the Committee upstairs and of what he repeated today.
4.30 p.m.
In order not to be misunderstood, let me read the next paragraph, which qualifies the matter in some way but in a way which is thoroughly unsatisfactory and which makes convincingly the case for this Amendment. That paragraph, which my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, North has quoted, reads as follows:
But an eligible small farmer who considers that he could increase the efficiency of his farm business if he were able to use an item of machinery or equipment that he could not afford to acquire outright"—
which is what we want him to do—
may well wish to form or to join a cooperative machinery syndicate.
I do not know what a co-operative machinery syndicate is. I do not know whether the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington, South (Sir P. Spens) knows what it is.

Sir Patrick Spens: As I have been named, I do. Long ago, when I was the Member for Ashford, the first combine harvester was bought by a syndicate of farmers none of whom could afford it individually, and they used it in turn.

Mr. Fletcher: I am sure that we are all very grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman. If that is what it means, it is all the more important that this Bill should give statutory provision to it so that farmers may know what is meant. As the right hon. and learned Gentleman would be the first to appreci-

ate, there is no warrant in the Bill as it stands, in the absence of this Amend-ment, to enable the Minister to make a grant for such an undefined group of people. As my hon. Friend the Member for Leek said, most farmers reading that paragraph will wonder what a co-operative machinery syndicate means. They will not have any idea how to form one. They will not know who of them is liable to repay the loan, and I am sure that it will lead to a great deal of confusion.

Mr. F. V. Corfield: Would not the hon. Gentleman agree that a farmer who never reads about the ordinary things which appear in the farming Press, which has been very full of this matter of syndicates lately, is probably not the sort of person who ought to be helped?

Mr. Fletcher: I should have thought he was the sort of person who ought to be helped. I am sorry if it is suggested that because there may be some farmers who have not obtained the degree of literacy of other farmers, they should be deprived of help.

Mr. Corfield: They ought to know what is going on.

Mr. Fletcher: This is an entirely novel doctrine which I am sure most of my hon. Friends would repudiate.

Mr. John Hall: Would the hon. Gentleman accept my assurance, as one with some understanding of these matters, that the great majority of farmers certainly do understand what is meant by a central machinery pool? Although they may not have taken part in running one, they understand how it operates.

Mr. Fletcher: If the majority of them understand what it means I am sure that there is a minority who do not understand. It is obviously desirable that the benefits of this Bill should be made universal. We are legislating to give the Minister power to do certain things and it is important that we should make express provision for it. The whole burden of the Minister's speech in resisting this Amendment was that he thought it was unnecessary. He thought that he could do what he wanted without this Amendment. He did not give a single reason for his objection to writing the words of the Amendment into the Bill.


As has been pointed out, this is merely permissive and I should have thought, to put it at its lowest, that in the interests of good legislation and good administration it is desirable that the Bill should make expressly clear the powers which the Minister intends to use and which we desire him to have.

Mr. Hare: I should like to answer some of the questions which have been raised in this debate. First, I should like to say something about the remarks of the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher). I can assure him that I have not tried to mislead the Committee on any of these matters. What is true is that there is a difference of opinion, and the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) made that quite clear.
I am not prepared to go as far as the Amendment goes. I made that clear in my previous speech. It is unfair to insinuate that I was trying to induce the Committee to believe that I was going as far as the Amendment intended I should go. I cannot go as far as the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) wants me to go, because—I will repeat this—the whole emphasis of our scheme is upon helping the viable farm unit as a single business. We do not think it right to give help to, say, three farmers, each with non viable farm businesses, merely because those three farmers had agreed to share some but not all of their labour or expenses. I hope it is clear that there is that difference between us.
The hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) and the hon. Member for Islington, East asked whether lawyers would have to be brought into these partnerships. The answer, as I said in my original reply, is that it is not essential to bring a legal partnership into being. As long as our advisory officers are satisfied that two or three people are determined to run their individual units as one single unit they will give advice. It may be that for their own protection farmers may wish to draw up legal partnerships, but that is not essential.
The hon. Member for Leek also asked how these machinery syndicates would be operated. Again, I do not think we should regard this as complicated. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington, South (Sir P. Spens) has given the answer. If a farmer wants

to buy a tractor or a combine harvester, and he has not got enough money, he can combine with wo or three others and they can buy it themselves. We have had a lot of experience of these machinery syndicates, and it is because of that that we would ask our district advisory officers to advise farmers how best to run their little machinery syndicates.
My hon. Friend the Member for Middleton and Prestwich (Sir J. Barlow) raised a point about fragmentation and asked whether people could reduce the size of their farms to enable them to benefit from the scheme. This must depend entirely upon the circumstances. If a farmer merely tried to fragment his existing farm so as to come into the scheme and there was no good agricultural purpose for doing so, our advisory service would not accept him as an applicant. If, on the other hand, after a year or so the advisory service thought that it was better in the interests of farming that a unit should become two, I do not say that that unit would not necessarily be considered for the scheme. We have to use the good sense of the men who would be responsible for the scheme.
The difference between the two sides of the Committee is quite clear. I have gone some way towards meeting the right hon. Member for Don Valley and his hon. Friends, but I cannot go as far as they would like me to go.

Mr. Thomas Fraser: I wish to say one or two words relating to Scotland. I am sure that the Secretary of State for Scotland would be the first to agree that the small farmers in Scotland are probably more adversely affected by the Bill than small farmers anywhere else in the United Kingdom.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) referred to the small farmers in Galloway. May I ask the Secretary of State whether it is not a fact that there are many hundreds of small farmers in the North of Scotland who are not crofters, and many hundreds in Caithness and Sutherland whose farm units are too small individually to qualify for assistance under Clause 1? These are farms of 2 to 20 acres. These farmers at present enjoy the advantage of M.A.P. grants. They get them now, but they lose them under the Bill in order to make money available to assist those who will benefit under Clause 1.
These hundreds of small farmers are farming the most difficult farmland. They are fanning in the most sparsely populated part of the British Isles and are living in an area where there is constant depopulation and considerable unemployment. I can think of the location of some of the groups of smallholders who are not crofters with 2 to 20 acres who will lose the M.A.P. grant. This Amendment would enable those people to come together and make a joint submission to be regarded as a business for the purpose of a grant under Clause 1.
The Amendment would be of great help to many hundreds of small farmers in the North of Scotland who will suffer great injury under the Bill as it is at present drawn.
Acceptance of the Amendment would not completely remove the grievance felt by those small farmers, but it would go some way towards meeting their difficulty. They could join together and get a capital grant in order to bring about an improvement in the businesses which they are trying to run. I assure the Secretary of State that if we are to rest on the declaration made by the Minister that he is concerned only with supporting viable units and those people who are farming less than 20 acres in the North of Scotland will not be assisted by the central Government because they are not operating viable units, the Minister's name will be mud, but that will be beside the point because he is not the Minister responsible. Those small farmers will wonder why it is that the Secretary of State allows this decision to be taken against the interests of those small farmers on the declaration by the Minister that they are not farming a viable unit.
I ask the Secretary of State to confirm or deny what I have said about the effect of the Bill on many hundreds of small farmers, and whether many hundreds of them who are not crofters will lose M.A.P. grants under the Bill and cannot qualify for assistance under Clause 1 unless the Amendment is accepted.

Lord John Hope: I think that the answer is that there is nothing whatever to stop very small men getting together and amalgamating.

Mr. Fraser: If the Under-Secretary wants 10 small farmers who are each fanning three, four, five, six or seven acres

to amalgamate for the purpose of the Bill it will be an amalgamation and the effect of that must be to turn many small farmers out of their farms. The only possible effect of the amalgamation of a large number of small farmers is to hasten and precipitate further depopulation. Is that what the hon. Gentleman wishes?

Lord John Hope: The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that the Minister made it perfectly clear—

Mr. E. G. Willis: The Minister does not know anything about Scotland. The Joint Under-Secretary speaks for Scotland, not the Minister.

Lord John Hope: What an extraordinary observation.
The Minister has made it clear that the Government recognises the problem of the very small farmers. We realise that that is a special problem by itself. Admittedly, the Bill does not cover the tiny man who farms five acres. That is a different problem which the Government recognise. To say that the Bill will not help every man with a farm of under 10 acres does not mean that we do not realise that there is a problem which has to be dealt with.

Mr. Fraser: Does not the Under-Secretary agree that the Bill injures every small farmer with under 20 acres in North Scotland? None of them will be eligible for grants under Clause 1.

Lord John Hope: I was specifically asked about men farming under 20 acres. As far as the continuation of M.A.P. goes for the next three years, each case will be considered on its merits by the A.E.C.s. I do not say that all the farmers will get it, because they have not been getting it even now, but they can still rank for it for the next three years.

4.45 p.m.

Mr. A. Woodburn: I have been told that even in the Slamannan plateau in the middle of Stirlingshire, land is extremely difficult to cultivate. When I was Secretary of State for Scotland it was found that acidity and other things in the soil made it difficult to be economic. Is it the Government's intention to depopulate and stop farming in great areas of Scotland? It seems so. Have they decided to


write off great chunks of Scotland as being not possible to farm economically?
If that is the case, then it is a policy which is contrary to everything done so far. In the past the Government's purpose has been to try to maintain the population in scattered and difficult parts. Do the Government propose to let these parts become wild again? If not, can the Minister give a pledge that the Government will go into the question of these difficult areas?
I cannot judge the accuracy of the complaints made to me, but if they are correct, this area in Stirling will be depopulated. Do not the Government propose to do anything to prevent that? I should like a pledge from the Government, between now and the passage of the Bill in another place, that they will consult the people concerned and relieve the public's mind by declaring that it is not the policy of the Government to let parts of Scotland go wild again.

Lord John Hope: The anxiety which the right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) expressed has been answered already, and I hope that others throughout Scotland who have read the White Paper have noticed what paragraph 5 says:
There are many farm businesses that are not capable of providing remunerative full-time employment to an average occupier. A considerable number of these are part-time only. To the extent, however, that non-viable farm businesses present a special problem the Government have been studying this and will continue to do so.
That applies every bit as much to farmers in Scotland.

Sir David Robertson: The hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) referred to my constituency. It seems to me that there are two classes of small farmer. First, there is the farmer with 70 or 80 acres of arable or permanent grass. I am told by

many farmer constituents, many of whom I met during the Recess, that they will not qualify under the Bill because they work a greater number of man-hours than the yardstick laid down in the Bill. I do not see how the amalgamation of two or three of these farmers would make them qualify, either in combination or by remaining alone. They feel sore about the matter. They think that the slothful will be helped while the efficient, hardworking man will be left to pay for their sloth.

There is another very serious difficulty and it is rather extraordinary in a crofting area. In the County of Sutherland there are 362 smallholders on 1,460 acres. This matter was raised at a mass meeting of farmers in Inverness, on Saturday, and considerable anxiety was expressed about it. These men do not come under the Crofters Commission, because they own their land or they are sub-tenants. They are now in receipt of marginal grant, I presume, but they will not be in future. Their position will be serious. The spokesman for the County of Sutherland said that they represented the finest type of agricultural stock. Most of them were working their own land. They were working their own small farms, and they worked for the big farmer, too.

I commend this point to the Secretary of State. It is a matter which should be inquired into, for I am quite certain that it would not be the wish of the Government to harm these hard-working artisans who have acquired enough money to buy a property or who work the land on a sub-tenancy. They would like to be tenants, but we have in Scotland an extraordinary system whereby a man in Australia can remain the tenant, and these men, therefore, cannot become tenants.

Question put,That those words be there inserted:—

The Committee divided:Ayes 190, Noes 219.

Division No. 19.]
AYES
[4.52 p.m.


Ainsley, J. W.
Blackburn, F.
Brockway, A. F.


Albu, A. H.
Blenkinsop, A.
Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Blyton, W. R.
Brown, Thomas (Ince)


Allen, Arthur (Botworth)
Boardman, H.
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Bonham Carter, Mark
Champion, A. J.


Awbery, S. S.
Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.
Chapman, W. D.


Bacon, Miss Alice
Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S.W.)
Chetwynd, G. R.


Balfour, A.
Bowen, E. R. (Cardigan)
Clunie, J.


Bence, C. R. (Dunbartonshire, E.)
Boyd, T. C.
Collick, P. H. (Birkenhead)


Bevan, Rt. Hon. A. (Ebbw Vale)
Braddock, Mrs. Elizabeth
Corbet, Mrs. Freda




Cove, w. G.
Jeger, George (Goole)
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Jeger, Mrs.Lena(Holbn &amp; St.Pncs,S.)
Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)


Davles,Rt.Hon.Clement(Montgomery)
Jones, Rt. Hon. A. Creech(Wakefield)
Probert, A. R.


Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.)
Jones, David (The Hartlepools)
Proctor, W. T.


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Rankin, John


Davies, Stephen (Merthyr)
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)
Redhead, E. c.


Deer, G.
Kenyon, C.
Reeves, J.


de Freitas, Geoffrey
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.
Reynolds, G. W.


Diamond, John
Lawson, G. M,
Rhodes, H.


Dodds, N. N.
Ledger, R, J.
Robens, Rt. Hon. A.


Donnelly, D. L.
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Dugdale, Rt. Hn, John (W. Brmwch)
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannook)
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)


Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Lindgren, G. S.
Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Lipton, Marcus
Ross, William


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Logan, D. G.
Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.


Edwards, W. J. (Stepney)
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson
Short, E. W.


Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)
McAlister, Mrs. Mary
Silverman, Julius (Aston)


Fernyhough, E.
McCann, J,
Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)


Fitch, Alan
MacColl, J. E.
Skeffington, A. M.


Fletcher, Eric
MacDermot, Niall
Slater, Mrs. H. (Stoke, N.)


Forman, J. C.
McGhee, H. G.
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
McKay, John (Wallsend)
Sparks, J. A.


Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.
McLeavy, Frank
Spriggs, Leslie


George, Lady Megan Lloyd(Car'then)
MacMillan, M. K. (western Islet)
Stewart, Michael (Fulham)


Gibson, C. W.
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Stonehouse, John


Gooch, E. G.
Mahon, Simon
Stones, W. (Consett)


Grenfell, Rt. Hon. D. R.
Mallalleu, E. L. (Brigg)
Strauss, Rt. Hon. George (Vauxhall)


Grey, C. F.
Mason, Roy
Stross,Dr.Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)


Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Mayhew, C. P.
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. E.


Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Mellish, R. J.
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)


Griffiths, William (Exchange)
Messer, sir F.
Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)


Grimond, J.
Mikardo, Ian
Viant, S. P.


Hale, Leslie
Mitohison, G. R.
Wade, D. W.


Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Monslow, W.
Warbey, W. N.


Hamilton, W. W.
Moody, A. S.
Watkins, T. E.


Hannan, W.
Morrison,Rt.Hn.Herbert(Lewis'm, S.)
Weitzman, D.


Hastings, S.
Mort, D. L.
Wells, Percy (Faversham)


Hayman, F. H.
Moss, R.
Wheeldon, W. E.


Herbison, Miss M.
Moyle, A.
White, Mrs. Eirene (E. Flint)


Hobson, C. R. (Keighley)
Neal, Harold (Bolsover)
White, Henry (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Holman, P.
Oliver, G. H.
Willey, Frederick


Holt, A. F.
Oram, A. E.
Williams, David (Neath)


Howell, Charles (Perry Barr)
Oswald, T.
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Howell, Denis (All Saints)
Owen, W.J.
Williams, Richard (Openshaw)


Hoy, J. H.
Paget, R. T.
Willis, Eustace (Edinburgh, E.)


Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Paling, Rt. Hon. W. (Dearne Valley)
Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)


Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)
Winterbottom, Richard


Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Paton, John
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Hunter, A. E.
Pearson, A.
Woof, R. E.


Hynd, J. B. (Atteroliffe)
Peart, T. F.
Yates, v. (Ladywood)


Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)
Pentland, N.
Younger, Rt. Hon. K.


Irving, Sydney (Dartford)
Plummer, Sir Leslie
Zilliacus, K.


Janner, B.
Popplewell, E.



Jay, Rt. Hon. D. P. T.
Prentice, R. E.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:




Mr. John Taylor and Mr. Rogers.




NOES


Agnew, Sir Peter
Burden, F. F. A.
Finlay, Graeme


Aitken, W. T.
Butcher, Sir Herbert
Fletcher-Cooke, C.


Anstruther-Gray, Major Sir William
Butler,Rt.Hon.R.A. (Saffron Walden)
Freeth, Denzil


Ashton, H.
Carr, Robert
Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.


Atkins, H. E.
Cary, Sir Robert
Gammans, Lady


Baldock, Lt.-Cmdr. J. M.
Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portstmth, W.)
Garner-Evans, E. H.


Baldwin, Sir Archer
Cole, Norman
George, J. C. (Pollok)


Barlow, Sir John
Conant, Maj. Sir Roger
Gibson-Watt, D.


Barter, John
Cooke, Robert
Glover, D.


Batsford, Brian
Cooper, A. E.
Glyn, Col. Richard H.


Beamish, Col. Tufton
Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Godber, J. B.


Bell, Philip (Bolton, E.)
Corfield, F. V.
Goodhart, Philip


Bell, Ronald (Bucks, S.)
Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne)
Gower, H. R.


Bevine, J. R. (Toxteth)
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.
Graham, Sir Fergus


Bidgood, J. C.
Crowder, Sir John (Finchley)
Grant, Rt. Hon. W. (Woodslde)


Biggs-Davison, J. A.
Davidson, Viscountess
Green, A.


Bingham, R. M.
D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Gresham Cooke, R.


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Digby, Simon Wingfield
Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)


Bishop, F. P.
Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA.
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.


Black, C. W.
Doughty, C. J. A.
Gurden, Harold


Body, R. F.
Drayson, G. B.
Hall, John (Wycombe)


Bossom, Sir Alfred
Duncan, Sir James
Hare, Rt. Hon. J. H.


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. J. A.
Duthie, W. S.
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.W.)


Boyle, Sir Edward
Eden, J. B. (Bournemouth, West)
Harris, Reader (Heston)


Braine, B. R.
Elliott, R.W-(Ne'castle upon Tyne. N.)
Harrison, A. B. C. (Maidon)


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W. H.
Errington, Sir Eric
Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)


Browne, J. Nixon (Craigton)
Farey-Jones, F. W.
Heald, Rt. Hon. 8ir Lionel


Bryan, P.
Fell, A.
Heath, Rt. Hon. E. R. G.







Henderson, John (Cathcart)
Mackeson, Brig. Sir Harry
Robertson, Sir David


Hicks-Beach, Maj. W. W.
Maclay, Rt. Hon. John
Roper, Sir Harold


Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)
Maclean, Sir Fitzroy (Lancaster)
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard


Hill, John (S. Norfolk)
McLean, Neil (Inverness)
Sandys, Rt. Hon. D.


Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Macleod, Rt. Hn. Iain (Enfield, w.)
Scott-Miller, Cmdr. R.


Hobson, John(Warwick &amp; Leam'gt'n)
Macmillan, Rt.Hn.Harold (Bromley)
Sharples, R. C.


Holland-Martin, C. J.
Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)
Smithers, Peter (Winchester)


Hope, Lord John
Maddan, Martin
Smyth, Brig. Sir John (Norwood)


Hornby, R. P.
Maitland, Cdr. J. F. W.(Horncastle)
Speir, R. M.


Hornsby-Smith, Miss M, P.
Markham, Major Sir Frank
Spens, Rt. Hn. Sir p. (Kens'gt'n, S.)


Horobin, Sir Ian
Marlowe, A. A. H.
Stanley, Capt. Hon. Richard


Howard, Gerald (Cambridgeshire)
Mathew, R.
Stevens, Geoffrey


Howard, Hon. Greville (St. Ives)
Mawby, R. L.
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Hudson, W. R. A. (Hull, N.)
Maydon, Lt.-Comdr, S. L. C.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J.
Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R.
Storey, S.


Kurd, A. R.
Moison, Rt. Hon. Hugh
Stuart, Rt. Hon. James (Moray)


Hutchison, Michael Clark(E'b'gh, S.)
Morrison, John (Salisbury)
Studholme, Sir Henry


Hutchison, Sir Ian Clark (E'b'gh,W.)
Mott-Radclyffe, sir Charles
Summers, Sir Spencer


Hyde, Montgomery
Nairn, D. L. S.
Taylor, William (Bradford, N.)


Iremonger, T. L,
Nicholls, Harmar
Teeling, W.


Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Nicholson, Sir Godfrey (Farnham)
Temple, John M.


Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)
Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'h, E. &amp; Chr'ch)
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Jennings, J. C. (Burton)
Noble, Michael (Argyll)
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Jennings, Sir Roland (Hailam)
Nugent, G. R. H.
Thompson, R. (Croydon, S.)


Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Oakshott, H. D.
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin


Johnson, Erie (Blackley)
O'Neill, Hn. Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)
Tiley, A. (Bradford, W.)


Jones, Rt. Hon. Aubrey (Hall Green)
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.
Tilney, John (Wavertree)


Joseph, Sir Keith
Page, R. G.
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Kerby, Capt. H. B.
Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale)
Vane, W. M. F.


Kerr, Sir Hamilton
Partridge, E.
Vickers, Miss Joan


Kershaw, J. A.
Peel, W. J.
Vosper, Rt. Hon. D. F.


Kimball, M.
Peyton, J. W. W.
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Lagden, c. W.
Pickthorn, K. W. M.
Walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Derek


Langford-Holt, J. A.
Pike, Miss Mervyn
Watkinson, Rt. Hon. Harold


Leavey, J. A.
Pilkington, Capt. R. A.
Webbe, Sir H.


Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.
Pitman, I. J.
Webster, David


Legh, Hon. Peter (Petersfield)
Pitt, Miss E. M.
Whitelaw, W. S. I.


Lindsay, Hon. James (Devon, N.)
Pott, H. P.
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Linstead, Sir H. N.
Powell, J. Enoch
Williams, R. Dudley (Exeter)


Lloyd, Maj. Sir Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Ramsden, J. E.
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)
Rawlinson, Peter
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Loveys, Walter H.
Redmayne, M.
Wolrige-Gordon, P.


Low, Rt. Hon. Sir Toby
Remnant, Hon. P.
Woollam, John Victor


Lucas, Sir Jocelyn (Portsmouth, S.)
Renton, D. L. M.



Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Ridsdale, J. E.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Macdonald, Sir Peter
Rippon, A. G. F.
Colonel J. H. Harrison and




Mr. Hughes-Young.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 3.—(SCHEMES FOR GRANTS TO PERSONS CARRYING ON CERTAIN SMALL FARM BUSINESSES IN SCOTLAND.)

5.0 p.m.

Mr. T. Fraser: I beg to move, in page 3, line 16, to leave out "not exceeding three years".

The Chairman: I think that the following Amendment, in page 3, to leave out lines 21 to 25, might be discussed at the same time.

Mr. Fraser: Yes, Sir Charles, I think that it would be convenient to take the two Amendments together.
We have now passed from the capital grants for small farm businesses to marginal agricultural production grants. The purpose of these two Amendments is to remove the terminal date which is written into the Clause for the payment of marginal agricultural production grants. The Clause provides that the modified

scheme for those grants will run for three years and then come to an end.
When we discussed the matter in Committee, the Joint Under-Secretary of State sought to justify the Government's policy in regard to M.A.P. grants by saying that the improvement brought about in the economic stability and well-being of those farms which had the benefit of the scheme had been so increased by the Hill Farming Act, 1946, the Livestock Rearing Act, 1951 and the hill cattle subsidies—and particularly the improvement in the price of stores in recent months which flowed from the higher beef prices in this country because of our inability to obtain beef from some of our traditional sources overseas—was evidence of such an improved well-being in those farms that the marginal agricultural production grants introduced in the early years of the war could now be discontinued. I think I have put the hon. Gentleman's case briefly but not unfairly; those were, I think, his principal arguments.
I do not accept those arguments. I argued in Committee that we could not


escape the conclusion that, if the Secretary of State were to adhere to the provisions of this Clause of the Bill, large areas of Scotland which have hitherto been kept in production with the aid of M.A.P. grants would soon begin to run down and production would fall. We should find ourselves with less beef and mutton and certainly less lambs and stores coming from those areas, and a great deal of the acreage which had been brought into reasonably good agricultural production during and since the war would revert to game and vermin.
The Joint Under-Secretary of State rejected all my argumentation. I called his attention to the Report of the Zuckerman Committee published quite recently—a Committee set up by the Government—which warned the Government of the need to keep marginal land in this country in full production. I called attention to the fact that we are much too dependent on overseas sources for the supply of our food. I said that it was the responsibility of the Government to maintain all the agricultural areas of the country in full production.
Nobody is asking for hot-house production in those hill lands, but we do want to see our hill lands which are capable of carrying sheep and cattle and those little bits at the bottom of the hills which are capable of providing some winter cake maintained in production. We think that the withdrawal of the grants will put many acres out of production.
The Secretary of State will, I think, concede that the farmers who have the benefit of M.A.P. grants in most of the 33 counties of Scotland, if not all of them, are not among the wealthiest farmers. There may be an odd one here and there who is a wealthy man. If he is, I rather think that he will have made his money not out of hill farming activities but out of some other activities. It is fair to say that among farmers in general, the men who will lose grants under the Clause are among the most needy and the less wealthy of our farmers—

Mr. Willis: And the hardest working.

Mr. Fraser: —and, as my hon. Friend says, among the hardest working.
The Secretary of State would, I think, say that, quite apart from whether they are wealthy or poor, those farmers show probably a smaller return on invested capital than any other class of farmer in Scotland. Therefore, I want to give the Government this further opportunity of saying that this scheme will not come to an end in 1962, but will continue.
When I made my speech upstairs in Committee, I quoted from the National Farmers' Union of Scotland. There was at least the suggestion that the National Farmers' Union did not feel strongly about this. If anyone could have thought that a few weeks ago, however, no one can be under any illusion now about what the National Farmers' Union of Scotland thinks about the ending of marginal agricultural production grants. We all have the literature which the N.F.U. has sent out giving examples of farmers in all parts of Scotland whose reduction in net income by the withdrawal of marginal agricultural production grants would be 30, 40, 50, 60 or 70 per cent., which is frightening to contemplate. That, however, is what the Bill contemplates if the Clause in its present form remains. It contemplates that there will be not only the reduction, on average, of 15 per cent. of net income, which was what the Joint Under-Secretary of State calculated—

Lord John Hope: Twelve to 15 per cent.

Mr. Fraser: I calculated it to be rather more than 12 to 15 per cent. The hon. Gentleman spoke of 3·3 per cent. of gross income. Therefore, he said, the withdrawal of grants would be an average of 12 to 15 per cent. of net income. A reduction of 12 to 15 per cent. of net income would be a serious matter for some of the most hard-working and poorly rewarded farmers in Scotland.
That, however, was an average figure. The Secretary of State and the Joint Under-Secretary of State must know full well that there are many farmers in Scotland whose net incomes are £400, £500 or £600 who are at present receiving marginal agricultural production grants of £200 to £300. That will all be withdrawn in the interests of Clause 1 of the Bill so that money will be found from within the industry to finance the capital grants made available under Clause 1. That is wrong and ought not to be done.
It is not only the Council of the National Farmers' Union which has opposed this proposal. In the weeks since we had the Bill in Committee, many hon. Members have attended meetings of their local branches of the National Farmers' Union. They have listened to the farmers themselves giving examples of the effect of the withdrawal of marginal agricultural production grants. Those of us who have not attended such meetings have met individual farmers. In any case, we have read the Press reports of what the farmers have told individual Members of Parliament.
We have also read that the landowners of Scotland, who are not noted for being violently anti-Tory Government, have come out with a declaration against the discontinuation of M.A.P grants because they know—everybody in Scotland knows — that if this withdrawal of M.A.P. grants is adhered to, it will have a disastrous effect in many parts of Scotland. We have had articles, not only in the agricultural Press, pleading with the Government to withdraw Clause 3. We have had articles in the Scottish national Press by the agricultural correspondents pleading with the Secretary of State to withdraw the Clause altogether. There was an excellent leading article in the Scotsmantoday leading the case for Scotland.
I beg the Secretary of State to make a concession. If he would accept the two Amendments, he would go some way towards removing the criticism that is being made about him in agricultural circles in Scotland, but he would not go all the way, because the criticism is of Clause 3 as a whole. If these Amendments were accepted, it would mean that the farmers in small units and those in units of more than 150 acres would still be outside the scope of the grants. The acceptance of the two Amendments, therefore, is not all that is needed.
I take the view that the marginal agricultural production grants have been amongst the most useful subsidies paid to agriculture during and since the war. The cost of this subsidy in Scotland is £1¼ million a year, but the total cost of subsidies to Scottish farmers must be in the region of £40 million. The Secretary of State knows better than any of us that he gets more return for this £1¼ million than for any other £5 million he spends on agricultural subsidies in Scotland.
I say without hesitation that, when one gives a subsidy of this kind, it should be given in respect of the land. It is because of the degree of marginality of the land that the subsidy is paid. I am not objecting to the payment of the subsidy to a wealthy landowner who happens to have some farms in hand. There are some wealthy people with farms in hand in Scotland who are getting the benefit of M.A.P. grants. I do not object to those people getting the benefit. What I do say, however, is that we should not only pay subsidies to people who need them; we should pay the subsidies in respect of the service that we wish to encourage, irrespective of who is carrying it on. The marginal land of Scotland, which at present attracts a subsidy according to the degree of marginality and according to the operations carried out on the land—the grants are not simply a blank cheque; the work must be done—and which warrants the payment of M.A.P. grants, should continue to attract the grants whether the land is part of a small farm, a middle-sized farm or a very large farm.

Sir James Duncan: Whatever the production?

Mr. Fraser: I am not aware that any of those people are engaged in production which is undesirable or unwanted by the community as a whole.

Sir J. Duncan: Some of it may be uneconomic.

Mr. Fraser: It may be uneconomic according to the hon. Member's yardstick, but the fact that every farmer in Scotland has to have a subsidy suggests that every farm in Scotland is uneconomic. Every farmer in Scotland gets a subsidy. I do not know why we should be giving subsidies to farms that would be economic without them. Presumably we justify the granting of a subsidy because the farm would be uneconomic without it.
5.15 p.m.
There can be no doubt in the Government's mind that every articulate person in Scotland who would appear to have any right to offer a view about this subject, except the Secretary of State and his subordinates, takes the view that M.A.P. grants should continue. Only the Secretary of State is in favour of their abolition.
I know full well that M.A.P. grants have never meant the same to the farmer south of the Border as they have to the farmer in Scotland, because there are not the thin marginal lands over the Border to the same extent as in Scotland. It may be that the Minister of Agriculture can justify to the farmers of England the discontinuation of such marginal agricultural production grants and schemes as have been in operation in England during and since the war, but the Secretary of State cannot justify the withdrawal of these grants in Scotland. I have not met a single person who has been willing to accept the justification offered by the Joint Under-Secretary of State. I do not believe that the Secretary of State has any justification which he can offer for the discontinuation of M.A.P. grants.
I beg the Secretary of State to offer some hope to those areas in Scotland where there is only marginal land and where we are losing population too rapidly. Let the right hon. Gentleman give them some hope and withdraw the Clause altogether. Only the right hon. Gentleman has the power to do that. If he cannot withdraw the Clause altogether, at least let him accept these two Amendments, which will mean that M.A.P. grants will not come to an end in 1962· If he takes them away from the farms which are too big and those which are too small, it will be easier to enlarge the scheme that is still running for farms between 20 and 150 acres and to bring in once again those of under 20 acres and those of more than 150 acres. I beg the Secretary of State either to take away Clause 3 altogether or, as the very minimum, to accept these two Amendments.

Sir D. Robertson: I beg to second the Amendment which the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) has moved so well. I regret to find myself at variance with the Government on this issue, but I am not at all lonely. I think that all the farmers in Scotland, or the overwhelming majority of them, hold the same views as I do.
My constituency will be the greatest sufferer by the withdrawal of marginal grants. The total cost of the scheme last year was £1,200,000 for the whole of Scotland, and for the five preceding years it was £1 million. The total cost, therefore, is only a fraction over £1 million

a year. I submit that no subsidy which has been given in agriculture has paid the same dividends as this one has done.
In the days of free trade these lands in the North became more depopulated. Families could not afford to work and live on the land and they migrated to all parts of the world. When this wise Measure was introduced in the dark days of 1942, in order to ensure the maximum production of food for human consumption, it brought succour to this territory. The improvement has gone on every year. The production of beef in Caithness has gone up by between 40 and 50 per cent. and it has also gone up in Sutherland. The same applies to sheep and to all agricultural produce.
The Committee should be made aware of the fact that these men must first spend money on the land before they get a grant. There is no chicanery and no loopholes for anything wrong. The feeling about this matter is extraordinarily strong.
What kind of land is it? There is not a more marginal country than Scotland in the British Isles. The map reveals that. The farmers with the aid of this grant have performed miracles on land which requires regeneration every year. On the coast we have good farmers, but they are on land which geologists call "blown sand" land, and every winter the gales blow more sand on to that land. I saw a demonstration of this when I was challenging on behalf of one of my constituents the rejection of a M.A.P. grant. I was getting nowhere by correspondence and I asked the farmers to put up two leading soil experts. They produced Mr. Munroe, a B.Sc. Agric, of Edinburgh University, who was for thirty years a soil expert for the Government of India, and Major Shaw who is the head of S.E.I. in the North. They accompanied us to the farm of Cuthill on the Dornoch Firth. There was the sea, the sand, the bents and whins, and then the farm began. That is typical of this part of the country.
The first field was a large one which had recently been cropped. I said, "That looks a good field." Major Shaw jumped over the fence, put his heel in the ground and twisted it in a half circle, and when he removed his foot I was looking into a small sand pit. That is no exaggeration. I have seen thousands of tons of sand right up the coast


of Sutherland and Caithness. The high land of Caithness is protected from the Ord up to Wick. Then, again, one gets the sand up to John O'Groats. I wonder whether any hon. Member has seen the land at Reiss and Dunnet behind Stoen. The problem has become so serious that students have spent their vacations there trying to clear away the sand. In the interior, of course, we have a tremendously high peat content.
In spite of these drawbacks, that area is where the finest foundation stocks of cattle and sheep are raised. What a wonderful use the land has been put to for the nation, the Highlands being used as a livestock rearing area, selling their stores to the low-ground farmers who finish them for the fat stock market. The withdrawal of these grants will mean using the good land as a breeding area, which would surely be a great misuse of the land.
On 10th November last, the date of the Second Reading of this Bill, I heard the reply to Question No. 3 put by my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Sir A. Hurd) to the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. My hon. Friend asked my right hon. Friend how beef production was going on. The answer he received was to the effect that for the quarter ended 30th September, 1958, production had gone down. I forget the actual figures of home production, but the total of imports of beef and of home production was down by 25 per cent.
Why should such a Bill as this be brought in? We are told that the emphasis is not on more production. Surely, production was never needed to a greater extent? Is it possible that the Government are thinking that the days of cheap labour in Argentina, Ireland and elsewhere are still continuing? Is it not obvious that wages have risen everywhere, and, in fact, that the whole world is rising against slave wages or poorly paid labour? Argentina is in no shape to send us beef. Therefore, it would seem all the more essential that M.A.P. grants should be continued.
What will happen to this land? In the Highland counties there are still thousands of acres of land which were once fertile and which are now moors and are carrying deer, which are no asset to the nation. I agree that deer certainly have

a place in the national life. No one is more in favour of that than I am, but let me assure the Committee that there is far too much land in the Highlands devoted to deer and sport. Much of that land once carried sheep and cattle and could do so again. One of the things which M.A.P. grants have done is to bring back a tremendous amount of land into cultivation.
As hon. Members know, I have been labouring this point for the last ten years in an effort to try and improve conditions in the Highlands and to make it possible for children born there and who wish to live their lives there to do so. Reclamation of moorland would mean that there would be more farms and crofts and a better livelihood for people and for industry. The Government failed on that. This blow to agriculture will produce a tragic situation.
On the eastern side of my constituency we have at the moment an unemployment rate of 14·7 per cent. That was the figure for December. I believe that the new figures are out today, but I have not yet seen them. The figure of 14·7 per cent. is a dreadful figure for a county that is so severely depopulated. If all the farmers are unanimous in saying that the land will go back and that they are forced to get rid of their biggest expense, labour, they will work on a smaller production and, in the end, the whole community will be uneconomic.
This is the first time that I have had the opportunity of talking on the Bill. I have made very serious attempts to speak on it already. I cannot think that the Secretary of State alone is responsible for this step which all the farmers regard as so retrograde. I feel that the hand of the Treasury comes into the matter. I regard this as a Treasury Bill. The politicians wanted to do something for the small farmers, which was a very praiseworthy and proper thing, but the Treasury said, "What are we going to get out of it?"
The cost in my constituency of the M.A.P. grants is £121,000. I asked the Secretary of State about the saving of this £121,000 which was going to be taken from my constituents in order to be given to other people. It is to be taken from the man with the greatest need, as was said by the hon. Member


for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), from the hard-working fellow doing a wonderful job on the soil and producing the finest cattle and sheep and also, let us not forget, the finest human stock which this country cannot afford to lose? We have lost far too many such people already and the first duty of any Government, whatever its colour, should be to encourage these families to remain on the land. I hope that when the overspill comes from Glasgow we shall get some of them, too.
I think that the Secretary of State has allowed himself to be put into chains over this matter and that it is our duty to help him break them. The only fair thing to do with regard to M.A.P. grants is to restore the status quo.

5.30 p.m.

Mr. J. Grimond: I take the view that if the Secretary of State was not in chains he must at least have been looking in the wrong direction when this Bill was drafted.
The effect of the Bill in Scotland will be more serious than perhaps he realises. It is a complicated Bill and perhaps its full effects were not at first fully appreciated. Whatever may be said about the general agricultural policy of the Government, it cannot be too often stated that the scheme of marginal production gives justifiable assistance to those farming on marginal land in Scotland, particularly in the Highlands and Islands.
It has two outstanding advantages. First, it improves the land and keeps the land improved in good heart. It puts capital into the soil of Scotland. Secondly, it helps the farmers who need help and who make good use of the help given. I can give examples in my own constituency of farms which carried 40 head of cattle before this scheme came into operation but which now, with its help, carry 160 or 170 head. It helps to produce a valuable supply of good store cattle from the Highland and Island areas.
The Government do not deny that some of the farms which have benefited under M.A.P. need further support. They are introducing a new and separate scheme for them. The small farmers' scheme, so far as the Highlands and Islands are

concerned, and particularly in my own constituency, suffers from very grave defects. First, it is temporary. Secondly, 450 standard man-days will exclude a great many farms which might have complied with the acreage. The Orkney farmer has to reckon both the man-days that he puts into growing the crop and the man-days he puts into working up animals. There is a very heavy allocation of time for poultry and many efficent farmers are likely to find that they are excluded from the help that is being given.
There is the bigger acreage farm over 150 acres and the small acreage farm, which are both being excluded as well. I do not think that there is any justice or rational argument behind it. I do not think that it will encourage efficient farming, or that it will get us more food and, above all, it is going to be a most serious setback to confidence in the Highlands and Islands and to employment. Neither confidence nor employment are any too good in the area as a whole at present.
In the northern islands of the Orkneys, about 40 farms will be affected by the withdrawal of M.A.P. I have heard it said by the Government that the amount of the M.A.P. contributions to the farming community is very small, but that is not the case if we consider individual farms in particular areas. There are at least a certain number of farms in the northern islands—I have examples of three or four—of which one-third of the net income comes from M.A.P. grants. The whole of the amount spent on the crofter counties under M.A.P. is, I think, £415,000. I believe that from these agricultural grants we get a very great deal of benefit. There may be a case against other subsidies and grants, but against this one I should have thought that there was very little cause for accusations of waste or lack of results.
I beg the Secretary of State to look at this matter again. I believe, first, that he should put back M.A.P. until he has something better to offer. Secondly, if he cannot do that I urge him to look at the standard man-days in the small farmers' scheme. So far as the Orkneys are concerned, this will be a discouragement to people to run their farms efficiently and I think that he will admit that it is too low for the benefit of the farmers he is


anxious to help. He ought specifically to put something in the Bill to take the place of M.A.P. if he is to cut out the farms over 150 acres entirely.
Thirdly, will he see whether he cannot do something for the owner-occupier, who is in exactly the same position as the crofter. The crofter can get generous grants from the Crofters Commission but the owner-occupier cannot. I do not believe that there is any fairness or reason in this. They are in the same position and many of them farm the same type of holding. I do not think that there is any excuse for excluding any owner-occupier under this Bill, which is a small farmers' Bill.
Lastly, it is essential, if we are to have this Act, that its administration should be efficient and up-to-date. As the Secretary of State knows, there is already a backlog of applications to the Crofters Commission in the Highlands area and we are not doing anything even to assist the Commission to catch up upon it.
This is a serious matter for the small farmers. Either they do not know whether they will have their scheme approved or not, or there is a long delay. Many will be rather unwilling to undertake some of the obligations under this Act and they will be more unwilling if they feel that they do not get assistance and quick results. I ask the Secretary of State to look at the effect of the introduction of the Bill and the withdrawal of M.A.P. from the Highlands and Islands.
I do not think that the Secretary of State can doubt that this will tend to depopulation, unemployment and lower production in an area of Scotland which is designated as needing help and which has made considerable attempts to help itself since the war, with success. This, in its present form, will be a retrograde and not a progressive step in Highland and Island agriculture.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. John Maclay): I should like to intervene at this point to say a word on some of the issues which have been raised. The Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) raised certain matters that do not arise out of these Amendments. I should not be able to follow them up, but I note what he said.
I am grateful to those who have moved the Amendment for the moderate and

reasoned way in which they have put their point of view. The effect, as (he hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) said, if the Amendments were accepted, would be that M.A.P. grants in their present form could go on indefinitely for farms under 150 acres, crops and grass. The Amendment would not affect what is happening to the larger farms.
My noble Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary met a deputation from the National Farmers' Union in Edinburgh on 6th January, when they put their views to him fully and frankly. I have also had expressions of views on this matter from a number of hon. Members, including the Member for Banff (Mr. Duthie), the hon. Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan), the hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Commander Donaldson), the Member for Inverness (Mr. N. McLean), and the hon. and gallant Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Sir W. Anstruther-Gray), and I have heard from a number of bodies, including the Scottish Landowners' Federation.
There seem to be two main representations against the Government's proposal. The first is that it is completely wrong to think of withdrawing M.A.P. assistance at all. It is suggested that this will result in reducing production, particularly beef production, and cause unemployment in upland areas. The second general comment has been that even if some modification of the M.A.P. scheme as it has operated in the past is now justified, changes should be introduced less abruptly. That has been stressed with vigour.
As to the first argument, while I recognise the sincerity with which the views have been expressed, I think that the fears are exaggerated. The hon. Member for Hamilton, in moving the Amendment, used fairly wide phrases about large acreages which would be put out of production and large areas of marginal land which would begin to run down. These are conjectural arguments. I know that that is a view expressed fairly widely, but it is by no means clear that it is true. If I had believed for one moment that the introduction of the Bill and its application to Scotland would have disastrous effects on a large area of land which is producing valuable food and providing a large


amount of employment, I would never have contemplated it for one moment. Nor am I convinced now that these expressions of view are necessarily right.
There are many ways in which the upland farmer is at present assisted and I think that it is not untimely to recall in detail what my noble Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary said when the Bill was in Committee and go through some of the forms of assistance that are available. All of them have become available since M.A.P. first started. None of them was available before then. All have been introduced since. If the Committee will bear with me I will go through them again.
First, there are the improved schemes under the Hill Farming and Livestock Rearing Acts designed to put land and fixed equipment into good shape. The hill farmers benefit from these. Under the same Acts there is the hill cattle subsidy and, in any year where it is considered necessary, there is the hill sheep subsidy. There is the calf subsidy, with its special provision to enable farmers in the hill and upland areas who have to sell their calves before the winter to obtain the benefit of the subsidy.
There are also all the more general production grants for cropping. These are available to hill farmers as well as to others. Some of the provisions which I have mentioned are available only to hill farmers, but there are others—for cropping, the building grant itself, the lime and fertiliser subsidy, the drainage grant and the bracken eradication scheme. I am going over some of the things which have been done to help this section of farming and to keep this part of our Scottish country in good heart and condition.
There is also the farm improvement scheme for individual items of capital equipment and there is the silo subsidy scheme to encourage the provision of silos. All of these have come into existence since M.A.P. was first introduced. It is well worth realising that this is not a question of withdrawing all assistance in these marginal areas. Of course it is not. It is a question of whether the M.A.P. schemes are the only conceivable way of doing what we all know to be necessary—keeping this part of our country in decent condition, subject to it

being a tolerable thing to do. The reclamation of land which can do a useful job is very much to be encouraged, but nobody will argue that we should do it regardless of whether the land will ever be any use to anybody.

Mr. T. Fraser: Nobody has said that.

Mr. Maclay: That is what I have just said; that argument has not been made. One sets a limit somewhere, and it is a question of choosing the best way of achieving what we all want to achieve. We are all after the same thing—the best, most efficient and constructive use of this type of land in Scotland.
Another thing which my noble Friend said earlier, and which I repeat, is that it is the Government's duty, and, of course, our determination, to keep the closest watch on the situation of all farming as it develops, including, of course, this type of land with which we are concerned today. It applies in particular in this case to the beef and sheep industries so far as successive Annual Price Reviews are concerned.
While assistance may, therefore, be required from time to time, I do not think that it is reasonable to maintain that, within the framework of the Government's general agricultural policy of support for agriculture and of improving the competitive position of home agriculture, the M.A.P. scheme as such is necessarily untouchable. That is what we have to get clear. There are all these other methods. We are concerned about this type of land and we have no intention or desire to see great acreages of any potentially useful land in Scotland going out of existence.

Mr. Fraser: Most of the new schemes and subsidies which the right hon. Gentleman has said were introduced since M.A.P. was first introduced in 1942 are subsidies available to farmers on the best land in the country. We are dealing here with a subsidy which is available to the farmers who are working the poorest land in the country. The first subsidy which the Secretary of State decides to take away is that available to farmers who are operating on the poorest land in the country.

Mr. Maclay: That is not correct. Part way through the list which I read I said that certain schemes were of general


application, but that is not true of all of them. I will not go over the list again, but some of them are deliberately designed and applied to the hill farming industry. The hon. Member for Hamilton implied in his interjection that everything I outlined in the way of assistance was available to the richest as well as to the poorest farmer.

Mr. Fraser: No.

Mr. Maclay: That is what the hon. Member said.

Mr. Fraser: No. I pointed out that after many additions had been made, the one subtraction which the Secretary of State seeks to make—and, incidentally, a subtraction with a view to providing another addition under Clause 1—is that which we are discussing. It is a subtraction made by taking money from people operating on the most difficult land in Scotland. They are the people who will make the sacrifice. Under Clause 1, on the other hand, some people operating on first-class land will qualify for subsidy. That does not seem right to me, nor does it seem right to the farmer.

Mr. Maclay: We are concerned about this type of land and we are concerned to make certain that the methods for helping such farmers are right and are the best methods in all the circumstances. I am glad that every hon. Member who has spoken has welcomed the application of the small farmers' scheme in the Bill. I know that in blessing that part of the Bill they have not accepted that the other part of it is necessarily right.
May I come to the second charge, that the M.A.P. assistance is being withdrawn rather sharply. I should recall that notice of impending changes was given by a statement in the last Annual Review White Paper and by Press publicity to the ending of the scheme on 31st August, 1958. While this made it clear that the whole future of the scheme was under review, I recognise that no definite indication of its probable outcome was available until the Bill and its associated White Paper were published in October and people had had time to think about them afterwards. It seems clear from what I have learned recently that a considerable number of marginal farmers in Scotland planned their farming operations for 1959 on the basis that, although there

would probably be changes, some assistance would still be available to them under the new proposals.
5.45 p.m.
This has been brought very strongly to my attention and I have noted it carefully. To help in this situation, we now propose that the M.A.P. scheme should be continued for a further year under existing powers, with the proviso that the assistance given to the larger farms—that is, those over 150 acres, crops and grass —should be on a reduced scale. The detailed application of all this will have to be decided in consultation with the A.E.C.s. I emphasise that under the Bill itself farms under 150 acres will rank for M.A.P. grant for three years within the discretion of A.E.C.s, as they do at present. The Bill lays down the period as three years, but the total period will now become four cropping seasons because of what I have just said about reintroducing the marginal scheme for this year, which we can do without altering the Bill and under existing powers.
I have listened to what has been said in the debate and I have been studying very carefully all comments made, and this course of action which I have just outlined gives my colleagues and myself another opportunity for assessing the whole position. That assessment will, of course, be made.
I should explain that since the previous M.A.P. scheme has lapsed it will be necessary to make a new scheme under Section 75 of the Agriculture (Scotland) Act, 1948, and a Statutory Instrument to that end is being prepared and will be ready as soon as possible. Agricultural executive committees will be given a revised allocation of money which will enable them to implement these proposals and farmers will be notified individually as quickly as possible how the proposals will affect them.
I recognise that what I have said does not necessarily meet certain views which may have prompted hon. Members to put down the Amendments. I suggest that it shows, however, that I have been watching the situation and listening very carefully to informed opinion as I gathered it, and that I have paid due regard to it and am anxious to meet what could be a case of hardship where the relatively short time available for the consideration of all these matters has put people in


difficulties. In the circumstances, it may be too much to hope that the Amendment will be withdrawn, but I still hope that it will be withdrawn.

Mr. Woodburn: I am sure that there is one point which we shall all welcome in the statement made by the Secretary of State—that further time has been given to think over this matter again. Nevertheless, I do not think that he has satisfied any of us on the main effect of the policy now being adopted.
I apologise for not having had the advantage of being on the Standing Committee and being able to follow the debate in great detail. In that respect, the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson) and I are in the same boat. As I understand, the Government have in mind some kind of farm which will be viable and which can live after all these things have been done. The farm has to live with the general subsidies and with the special subsidies which the Secretary of State elaborated. That is, a farmer who can live with all the other subsidies, with the exception of M.A.P. aid, will be allowed to survive.
Is not that the ultimate policy? There are some farms which are not considered worth saving. Therefore, when M.A.P. aid is withdrawn, and other assistance is given to bring those farms into a viable position, those then able to live will be allowed to survive and those unable to do so will be allowed to die. Therefore, there must be in the minds of the Secretary of State and of the Department a number of farms in Scotland which will cease to exist as farms, and the men will have to move out of them altogether.
It would be interesting to know what number of farms of that kind will go out of existence, according to the Secretary of State's calculations. When we on this side of the Committee had the responsibility of trying to revive British agriculture and get the land brought into a state in which it could produce a much bigger proportion of our food supplies, we had to think of the best methods calculated to achieve that end. I was convinced then, and I am still convinced, that the best method is by directional subsidy, that is a subsidy requiring something to be done and some definite clear result and not a subsidy giving general help whether or not anything is accomplished by it.
One of the problems which we were not able to solve was how to assist marginal farms which otherwise would not be cultivated without, at the same time, putting money into the pockets of people who had plenty already. That has always been the problem. If the Secretary of State has formed a view of the farm that could live on its bare earnings and the subsidies left over when M.A.P. aid goes, that must be the farm on which all the subsidies must be based. It follows that all the other farms on better land, with better possibilities, will obviously get much more advantage so that the fellow on the margin can live. That is the old story of Ricardo's economic rent, because once one gets above that one cannot avoid helping the farmers who are on the better land.
I am told that in Slamannan, in my constituency, 150 acres of land are considered to be equivalent to 30 acres or less in East Lothian. Therefore, the poor man who is working on this "thin skin of soil," as my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Eraser) called it, cannot be compared at all with a man who is working on very much richer land. It may be that the Secretary of State has decided that these people who are wringing a living out of the soil would be better occupied in doing something else and that we should allow Caithness and Sutherland to go back to the wild. We on this side of the Committee took the view that agriculture was an essential part of the social life of the community, that Scotland should not be depopulated and that if people populated Sutherland, Caithness, Ross-shire and the Outer Isles it should be made possible for them to make a living on the soil.
I should like the Secretary of State to tell us exactly at what level he has decided that the lowest economic farming in Scotland must be carried out, because the Bill means that below that level people must go out, whether to America or Canada, and leave Scotland to the deer and rabbits, though I am sure that the rabbits cannot live there, because there is not enough soil even for them to burrow into. It follows that it must be difficult enough for farmers to make a living there.
I have tried to understand the policy which the Bill represents. I have not had the benefit of being a member of the Standing Committee, but I have read the


speeches made in Committee and I should like to know what the Secretary of State has decided. Apparently, he has decided that farms must be enabled to become economic units and he is prepared to give farmers capital grants to equip those farms. But no matter how much capital is put into some of these farms and no matter what amount of machinery is employed, there is at the end not sufficient soil to cultivate. It may be that Mr. Hobbs, in Fort William, can make an economic unit of his land by employing bulldozers, flattening out hillsides, and scattering on the soil material from his distillery. He may be able to so capitalise the land that it becomes an economic unit, but is all the investment that the nation has made in cattle production now to be thrown away, and is it to be said that we no longer need that capital and no longer need to cultivate all this land?
There is no need of the Bill unless it eliminates the fringe. I understand that in the Orkneys the population is drifting into the bigger islands and the population there in turn drifts into Aberdeenshire and other places. Gradually, the fringes of Scotland are becoming steadily depopulated. I know of a village where there used to be 120 children at school, but there were only two on the last occasion that I visited it, and I suppose that for some considerable time now the school has been closed.
The Bill is a further step in bringing to the centre the fringe of agriculture in Scotland. The Secretary of State should come clean and state his policy, because if we are to introduce new machinery in the form of this Bill we should have a clear picture of what the result will be. I should be glad if the right hon. Gentleman would tell us what type of farm he has in mind, how many he thinks will go out of existence and how far the population now occupied with agriculture in Scotland will be reduced when this policy is finally implemented.

Mr. W. S. Duthie: I listened to the statement by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland with very considerable relief and not a little thankfulness. I look upon his statement as providing us with a breathing space now, and I suggest that that breathing space of one year should be used to the full to establish a true picture of marginal

farming in Scotland in all its aspects, with the help of the N.F.U. and the agricultural executive committees. I am particularly glad that the decision to exclude farms of 150 acres and over is now to be delayed, because it seemed to me that there was a tinge of savagery in the way in which they were to be summarily deprived of marginal aid.
I feel very strongly that marginal farming in Scotland is a very special problem. Anyone who doubts that need only have seen the conditions under which marginal farmers were operating in the last few weeks in blizzards. Special consideration should and must be given to marginal farming in Scotland. While the Bill meets some of the need, it is not the answer. But now we have a year when we can make preparations in an unhurried atmosphere and when all the pros and cons can be weighed and ways and means can be devised to meet these needs. My predominent feeling at this stage is one of gratitude that we have got this breathing space.

6.0 p.m.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: The hon. Member for Banff (Mr. Duthie) has talked about gratitude. All I can say is that he is thankful for very small and uncertain mercies, and I am sure that his gratitude will not be shared by the farming community in Scotland.
Unlike my right hon. Friend the Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn), I had to sit in the Committee, and I did not think it was possible for anybody to put up a worse case for a Bill or with less knowledge of the agricultural position in Scotland than the noble Lord until I heard the Secretary of State for Scotland today, and in that respect he achieved what I regarded as the absolutely impossible.
The position is this; it is the old story that we are all out of step except our Jocks. There are two of them. They have been completely deserted by every follower they have in Scotland, and when the question is put to them, "What is your long-term policy" they cannot give a reply. Of course we do not expect the right hon. Gentleman and the noble Lord to know. We have given up any hope of that. The right hon. Gentleman and the noble Lord talk about agriculture and say "You have one year's


reprieve". What a curious way of looking at the problem.
I wonder what Sir William McNair Snadden will say about that one. He used to urge the Labour Government year after year for a long-term policy for food production in the Highlands. I do not know what he is thinking in retirement. All I know is that Lord Strathclyde is very glad that he resigned in time. And now the boys are left upon the burning deck and nobody envies them. They have antagonised everybody, even the landlords. I thought it was impossible for them to do that, but here today we have a statement from the Central Landowners' Association saying that they view with the gravest apprehension the Government's policy and they fall in line with the National Farmers' Union.
That is what has been given them, a year. They did not listen to the criticism of the National Farmers' Union but the landlords have shifted them. Naturally the landlords, too, want to know what is the long-term plan, because of the previous Agriculture Bill, where we were told we must do away with the security of tenure so that they could get increased rents. Now the policy is so muddled, even for the landlords, that they are beginning to wonder where they will get the rents guaranteed to them in the previous Bill.
I feel embarrassed about this. What am I going to do at the next election when the Central Landowners' Association comes along and offers me mass support? Imagine all the different noble Lords and landlords I have denounced for a lifetime, saying, "For goodness' sake take our motor cars because we have to vote for you in preference to the other fellows". This Government is absolutely discredited from left to extreme right now. How they will explain this situation in Galloway, I do not know. I hope they will send the two Jocks there and then the Government will lose its deposit.
The hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) and I represent an agricultural area, and we have been egged on to oppose this Bill by whom? By the vice-chairman of the county council, who is a Conservative. He writes two well informed articles every week, one in the Scottish Farmerand the other in

the Kilmarnock Standard.For the last few months he has not had time to attack the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and me because he has been concentrating on the Government. Now the Government have not even got the support of the Tories in our constituencies, and the criticism of the vice-chairman of the county council is in the form of an explanation of why the Secretary of State for Scotland and the noble Lord are supporting this Bill. He says that it is the hare-brained child of Hare. The truth lies in that sentence. It is an English Bill and Scotland has been shoved in as an appendix. We are trying to remove the appendix.
This criticism has come from the Conservative spokesman of the agricultural interests in our area. While we do not agree with him politically, we have to admit that agriculturally he is considered as good as any other agriculturist in Scotland or in the country generally, and he says that Scotland has ceased to matter very much these days and the Government just put it into English Bills. This is true. Even the Faculty of Advocates agrees with that now. Even the dean of the faculty of the lawyers in Scotland says that the Government have gone too far and are legislating for peculiarly Scottish matters merely by appendices to English Bills which they are ramming through these Committees, and the agricultural executive committees are run by English landlords. The next thing we can expect is a revolt of the landlords in the House of Lords.
What is the meaning of this? The meaning is that the Government wanted to do something to try to get the farming vote at the next election which it lost through the last Agriculture Bill. The Government know very well that every intelligent farmer knows that this Tory Government took away from him security of tenure and are trying to dangle before the eyes of the farming community the idea that they are going to do something for the small farmer. I wonder why they have not tried to do something for the small shopkeeper at the same time?
What does this mean for the small farmers? The Secretary of State says that everybody agrees with doing something for the small farmers, but what is it? We do not know. We do not know


who is to benefit in Scotland. Our problem will arise when our farmers write to us and request us to ask the Secretary of State for Scotland to look at the applications which have been turned down. I put a question to the noble Lord, and in view of the fact that we are likely to hear that this will give a great deal of benefit to the small farmers, I think we should devote some attention to it.
If this is going to mean great benefit for thousands of small farmers in Scotland, what will be the increased cost of administration? If thousands of applications come in, at least some extra staff will be needed even to read the applications, to go round looking at the land, to consider what scheme should be approved. I put that question to the noble Lord and he did not know the answer at first—naturally we did not expect him to do so—but he went to the Box and came back with the answer. This was that there will not be any increase in staff in Scotland worth speaking about. So what is to be the benefit to the small farmer?
No, this scheme is purely a piece of flashy, political window-dressing, as every intelligent farmer now recognises, and hon. Gentlemen opposite know it. How many hon. Members supported the noble Lord during the Committee stage? None of them did. The hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Sir C. Thornton-Kemsley) supported the Government at first by saying he did not think the National Farmers' Union was opposed to this. I suppose the hon. Gentleman has become wiser now that the pages of the Scottish Farmerare full of the strongest possible criticism of the Government.
I see the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Nairn) in his place. He has a majority of about 167, but that will disappear at the next election because the farmers will not vote for him next time. He has not yet realised it, but every hon. Member opposite has realised it. The position is indefensible and hon. Members opposite have never tried to defend it. What the hon. Member for Banff said was no defence. In Committee hon. Members opposite appealed to the noble Lord to be more flexible. They wanted their "hopes" to be more flexible. From the way they

ask for more flexibility, one would have thought that they were talking about elastic and not agriculture. The Government have proceeded in face of the opposition of land owners, farmers and their rank and file who have not had the courage of the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson). They have pushed the Bill through obstinately and stupidly against the wish of the whole agricultural community.
There has been a series of leading articles on the subject in the Scottish Farmer,by no means a supporter of the Labour Party. Its leading article last week said that the wintry weather which we had had in Scotland had not had so chilling an effect on the farmer as the prospect held out by the Bill. There was a whole page devoted to speeches made by well-informed farmers a fortnight earlier. Hon. Members opposite can read what their farmer friends said about them. The report said:
Scottish farmers from Shetland to Galloway stand together in solid phalanx in their determination to keep on trying up to the last hour to persuade the Government to accept Amendments to the Agriculture (Small Farmers) Bill. The conference was marked by complete solidarity of view of over 40 representatives of all kinds of farming.
I will not go into details and make it difficult for hon. Members opposite. They know the situation and they know that there will be questions at the next election, questions which Government spokesmen will not be able to answer. There is no doubt that every hon. Member who votes against the Amendment will vote against the interests and future of the farming community in Scotland. There was a time when Scottish farmers voted Tory because their fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers had done so before them. If they have any commonsense, they will not do so next time. Instead they will turn out the Government overwhelmingly from every agricultural constituency.

Sir J. Duncan: If the speech of the hon. Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) had been a little shorter, it would have been even more humorous and we would have enjoyed it more. However, his last few sentences were a tirade against the Government about the Bill generally and not about the Amendment, thus spoiling an otherwise humorous and acceptable


speech. The Council of the Scottish N.F.U., at a meeting on 4th November, 1948, said that it would do all in its power to make a success of the scheme, with which I do not now want to deal since it is not the subject of the Amendment.
6.15 p.m.
There has been a great deal of exaggeration, with the exception of my right hon. Friend's speech, about M.A.P. Even the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) did not understand the scheme, because he got mixed up about points which have nothing to do with the Amendment. My hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson) also greatly exaggerated the effect of MA.P. M.A.P. is in addition to all the other things which did not exist when M.A.P. first came into existence.
M.A.P. was started in 1941, at a time when our shipping was being sunk by enemy submarines and when the predominant need for Britain was to get the maximum grain production from every acre. There was no other method of helping hill farmers except M.A.P. Since then, we have had ploughing grants, hill farming livestock rearing legislation, hill cow subsidies and other schemes. The situation is that marginal land farmers, in addition to all those other things, still get M.A.P., only slightly altered from what it was in 1941.
The Government have to decide whether in the country's changed economic circumstances that additional aid can be justified. My right hon. Friend suggested that there were two lines of thought: first, that there should be no change; and, secondly, that any change should not be too abrupt. He added that it was only right to say that MA.P. could not and should not be regarded as untouchable for all time. I do not want to argue that now, but I do agree with the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) that M.A.P. has shown less waste and produced more good results than any other farm subsidy scheme applicable to hill farmers.
After my right hon. Friend's statement, it is obvious that the whole matter must be reconsidered since for big M.A.P. farmers the new proposals will end at the end of August of this year, so that

there is only one more year of MA.P. in a modified form left. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Banff (Mr. Duthie) that we must be grateful for my right hon. Friend's statement as far as it went, since it will give us time to reconsider the matter.
If MA.P. is to be changed or continued, there is no logical reason why Scotland should not get it, even if the English choose not to have it any more. The conditions of land, climate and distances are very different in the two countries and there is a case for making M.A.P. exceptional for Scotland, and possibly for the hills of Wales, even though the English do not want it any more.
We now get the new statement that the smaller M.A.P. farms—which can be interpreted as those with up to 150 acres of crops and grass and between 400 and 500 ewes; I believe that this is being left to the discretion of the agricultural executive committees—will receive a grant at a rate of 100 per cent. this year, and will be eligible under the M.A.P. scheme under Clause 3 for the subsequent three years. They therefore now have four years instead of three.
We have been asked to vote against the Bill. It would be mad for those who have small M.A.P. farmers in their constituencies to throw away what was formerly three years' help and is now four years' help.

Mr. Willis: We should not be doing that at all.

Sir J. Duncan: In fact, we would.

Mr. T. Fraser: No.

Sir J. Duncan: I now want to deal with the larger M.A.P. farms, with more than 150 acres of crops and grass and more than 500 ewes. My right hon. Friend has said that they will receive a modified form of M.A.P. grant for this year, presumably meaning the year ending on31st August, 1959, because that is the end of the crop year. Most of them ought to have planned their production last autumn. They will not get very much done between now and the time to get on with it, in the way of replanning their production based upon the new assistance that they will get. They may have time to purchase their fertilisers and plant certain acres or reseed a certain field.
I would, therefore, ask my right hon. Friend to get out the Order under Section 75 of the 1948 Act tomorrow, if possible, so that detailed consideration can proceed at the earliest possible moment. He has said that consultations would take place with the executive committees. I hope that they will not be at arm's length. I hope that my right hon. Friend will call together the chairmen of the executive committees at Edinburgh on Friday and say, "Can you work these conditions? If so, do so, and we will put it right."
If we start writing to each other from Inverness to Galloway, and try to get each executive committee to agree to everything, it will take a much longer time to get agreement on the new conditions. Speed will make all the difference to these people if they are to receive help this year and are to plan their production to the best advantage.
As for the conditions, I would say that in 1941 the M.A.P. scheme was meant to be a form of assistance for growing crops, because we wanted the grain and everything that we could get. The idea now is to grow stock and not crops. The switchover is from grain at any cost to meat at economic prices. I interrupted the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) because I wanted to find out whether he believed that we should subsidise, at wholly uneconomic rates, everything that these people were now producing.
In the switch-over to the new conditions we should concentrate the aid in the direction of rearing breeding stock —cattle, calves and sheep—and we should not encourage the growing of more grain or straw than is necessary for the economy of a stock farm. Nor should we encourage the growing of rape to fatten wedder lambs or wedder hogs. That is really the function of the low ground farmer. Thirdly, we should not encourage the growing of potatoes at the taxpayers' expense—because the grant has been from 85 to 95 per cent. The economy of these M.A.P. farms should be switched from their original purpose of growing grain at all costs to the new purpose of being reservoirs of store livestock.
I believe that such a switch would be acceptable to those who will be feeling the draught of the abolition of M.A.P. in the future. If my right hon. Friend

can act with speed upon the lines that I have suggested it would be acceptable to all for this year, but I would urge the necessity for speed in the reconsideration of a long-term policy. I am grateful for the fact that everybody has been given an opportunity of rethinking the matter through the concessions which my right hon. Friend has been able to give.

Mr. Neil McLean: I was very glad to hear my right hon. Friend say that he would continue the M.A.P. schemes for another year. I was also pleased to hear his assurance that he would keep the matter under review. If I understood him correctly, this means that he will have a definite review before the M.A.P. scheme comes to an end, but unless I have a more definite and categorical assurance that there will be a review of the workings of the new M.A.P. scheme and the small farmers' scheme I shall find it very difficult to support the Government in the Division Lobby against the Amendment.
I would go further, and say that I do not think that the Amendment deals satisfactorily with one or two other worries that we have, one of which is that the farm of over 150 acres will be excluded even under the new M.A.P. scheme for this year. I do not know whether I understood my right hon. Friend correctly to say that such farms would be so excluded, but, if so, I would point out that the figure of 150 acres is a very arbitrary one. It may be all right in England, but everyone realises that it is a very different matter in Scotland, which has a different fertility of soil, different weather conditions, and longer distances from the markets. All these factors mean that this figure is arbitrary and not suited to farming in Scotland.

Mr. Maclay: The words that I used were that we now propose that the M.A.P. scheme should be continued for a further year under existing powers, with the proviso that the assistance given to the larger farms—that is, those with over 150 acres of crops and grass—should be upon a reduced scale, but not wiped out altogether.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean by "a reduced scale"?

Mr. McLean: I thank my right hon. Friend for that explanation. I hope that


6.30 p.m.
the scheme which is to continue on a reduced scale will be tied in with the other schemes for helping marginal and hill farms, so that not a great deal of harm will be done to those farms of over 150 acres. It is most important that the judgment should be not on the size of the farm, but on the degree of marginality. I hope—and I think that he did say this—that in deciding which farms would be in the scheme and which would be out of it in this year's M.A.P. scheme, my right hon. Friend will be in very close consultation with the agricultural executive committees. I hope that in the review, and after the review and in the future working of the scheme, these committees will have a very definite say in what farms are to receive marginal aid. These are the people who know the local conditions.
I am sure that all of us agree that the M.A.P. scheme has done a tremendous lot of good in the Highlands. Personally, I must admit that I would much prefer that the ploughing-up grant should go rather than the M.A.P. scheme, but at this stage it is too late to go into that. I hope that my right hon. Friend can give us a little more specific assurance about the working of this scheme, and that he will say that the supplementary M.A.P. scheme envisaged in the Bill will not come to an end in three or four years' time unless he has had a comprehensive review into the working of all these schemes.

Mr. Willis: I wish to support the plea made by the hon. Member for Inverness (Mr. N. McLean), because it seems to me that the Secretary of State has not given a definite pledge about the future of this scheme. As I understand the statement which he has made, he is to continue the scheme for an additional year for farms of 150 acres and over, but at a reduced scale. He said that it would be restricted. I will come to the farms of under 150 acres in a moment, but the right hon. Gentleman said that for those of 150 acres and over, the scheme is to be continued for a year but on a reduced scale. [Interruption.]That is precisely what he said, and after that it ends.
In any case, the death penalty comes into force there, as one hon. Member said, in about eight months' time, so that

all that we have got is a concession for eight months. In respect of the farms under 150 acres, the right hon. Gentleman has given an additional year. [HON. MEMBERS: "It is the same."] I know it is the same, but that makes four years under this Clause. The hon. Member has suggested that if we rejected the Amendment we would, in fact, be stopping this, but we would be doing nothing of the kind. We would be continuing it indefinitely by voting for our Amendment. Let there be no misunderstanding at all about this.
What the right hon. Gentleman has not done, but what I think he ought to have done, was to say that if there was anything wrong about the present provision for the farms receiving marginal grants it would definitely be examined, but he did not say anything of that kind at all. All he said was that he would watch the situation; I think those were his words. That is not enough, because, allied to the question of watching the situation, we have also to take into account the fact that the Government are determined more and more to place agriculture on an economic footing and judge it in those terms. When the Government do that, of course, and they have been doing it increasingly, we are faced with the difficulty, in the Highlands and elsewhere, that farms cannot necessarily be made economic. We have to face that, and remember that there are wider implications involved here—social implications which cannot be met in purely economic terms.
What my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) said was quite correct. Either the withdrawal of these grants means something or it means nothing. If, in fact, it means something, it means that some farms will not be able to pay, and that in other cases the net income of the farm will be considerably reduced. In other words, the standard of living in the area is to be considerably reduced. That was the question put by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire. What we have not had today is an indication of the Government's estimate of the effect of this proposal in the Highland areas or in other areas where marginal land is exceedingly important.
What is the number of farms affected? What is the fall in the standard of living


likely to be? During the Committee stage, the noble Lord the Joint Under-Secretary gave a figure of 3¾per cent. reduction in the gross income of farms, which has been exposed as being very little indeed. It means nothing at all. What will the actual effect be? The hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson) said in his speech that any reduction of the standard of life of large numbers of these people who are in receipt of these grants spells disaster.
Even if we accept the figure of the noble Lord, as applied by my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), that reduction spells disaster for a very large number of farmers, and the right hon. Gentleman is not lessening that disaster by saying that he will continue the scheme for a year, unless, at the same time, he pledges himself to do something about it during that additional period. Up to the present, the right hon. Gentleman has not said that. He has said that we will watch it, but watching will not do very much. We want a definite undertaking that something will be done, and that he in fact intends to avoid that disaster.
As the speeches which have been made have shown, this point has to be emphasised. We want to know what is in the Government's mind. Do they intend the farms in these areas to be shut down, go to waste or go over to wild life in the future? Is that their intention? If so, to what extent, if they intend this to be carried out, do they intend to survey all these grants with a view to ensuring that these people who are living in a state of fear today may know that the Government intend to do something to protect them?

Mr. Michael Noble: I do not want to take up much of the Committee's time this evening, because a great many of the arguments which are relevant have already been produced, but I should like to refer to what the right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) said when he explained how difficult it was for Governments to give the necessary help to the smaller people when they needed it, without, at the same time, giving too much to others.
The whole course of this debate has, in fact, shown that the Government's broad view on this matter is the right

one, because all the speeches have been made on the basis that we who farm in the more difficult parts of the Highlands need a great deal of extra help of one sort or another. Whether it is for the purpose for which M.A.P. was originally intended or not is not, perhaps, always too relevant to the discussion, but we in the Highlands know quite well how often we are used as an argument for getting something for other people, and we get a little bit tired.
I, for one, would certainly not agree with the statement made from the other side of the Committee that we should oppose this Bill, because the effect of that would be quite simply that some money would be wasted in other parts of the country while we should not get what we want in Scotland. I have great confidence that my right hon. Friends, who will be thinking about this problem in the next eight months, will devise a scheme by which the necessary help can be given to the people who need it. I know that it is easy for hon. Members opposite to express their lack of confidence, but I remember a little bit about the way they removed subsidies from the hill farmers before they went out of office.

Mr. T. Fraser: The hon. Gentleman has accused hon. Members on this side of taking away subsidies from the hill farmers. Would he specify them? Would he tell us which ones they were?

Mr. Noble: The calf subsidy was removed in 1950, although it was one of the most useful subsidies and was most necessary if we were to build up our beef population in the Highlands.

Mr. Fraser: Does not the hon. Gentleman know the opinion of the National Framers' Union, and whether the N.F.U. wanted the calf subsidy in the first place?

Mr. Noble: Hon. Members opposite are complaining that the Government are trying to stop the production of beef on the hills in Scotland and I am reminding them that they removed the calf subsidy which I, as a farmer who was trying to produce beef, knew was extremely important.

Mr. Fraser: Did not the hon. Member and his Friends want it removed because they preferred to support the Livestock Bill which we introduced?

Mr. Noble: It would be unwise for the hon. Gentleman to argue that the N.F.U. is always right. If he did, he might occasionally find himself in difficulties. I have confidence that my right hon. Friend will consider this problem carefully, and that there are ways in which money that we used wisely in the past can continue to be used wisely in the future.

Mr. William Ross: I am surprised at what has been said by Government supporters. I believe that those acquainted with military tactics would tell them that when we have our man on the run we should keep on attacking. We have wrung a small concession from the Secretary of State for Scotland. What do Government supporters do? They go down on their knees and thank him for it, except for one hon. Gentleman, the Member for Inverness (Mr. N. McLean). I give him the credit due to him for his action, because I think his tactics were right. We should keep up the attack.
What are we doing? We are not discussing a statement made by the Secretary of State for Scotland today, but an Amendment which would remove a limitation on additional help to small farmers after three years. If the Clause goes through without the Amendment because Government supporters do not vote for the Amendment, it will mean that the limitation will remain. The present discussion has been not on the Amendment, but upon a suggestion thrown out by the Secretary of State for Scotland that he will study the problem over the next eight months. There is only one problem that the Secretary of State will be worrying about over the next eight months; that is, how many of his Scottish Tory colleagues he will lose. One question will be whether the Joint Under-Secretary of State, who has a majority of about 200, will remain with him.
The only thing that the Secretary of State for Scotland did not announce today was the date of the General Election. But he did tell us that the latest date will be October, which means limiting the uncertainty to this year. Judging by how long the M.A.P. is to be continued, the farmers can start getting worried next year, after the General Election. Anyhow, we have to thank the

right hon. Gentleman for the small mercy that the problem will be "thought of".
What guarantee is there that the Secretary of State will do anything? We have here a great new revolutionary scheme. We were told by the hon. Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan), in a most illogical speech, all about the background of M.A.P., how wrong it is now, and then he thanked the right hon. Gentleman for carrying it on.
6.45 p.m.
What the Secretary of State has conceded makes absolute nonsense of the whole Bill, and, in particular, of Clause 3. I invite the attention of Government supporters, who are concerned about what is happening in agriculture. The hon. Member for Argyll will get an awful shock from his Liberal and Labour opponents in the General Election. The kind of thing he said in the by-election was not the kind of thing he has said here today. In the General Election, some time this year, the hon. Gentleman's constituents will be concerned not about what happened in 1950, but about what has happened in the few months during which the hon. Gentleman has been fortunate enough to be a Member of Parliament.
I invite Government supporters to have another look at the Amendment. The Minister has said, "I am making this change and I do not require any alteration in the Bill to enable me to do it. I already have the power." It means that the concession the right hon. Gentleman has given by continuing the M.A.P. 100 per cent. to farms of from 100 to 150 acres and at a reduced rate above 150 acres for this year, can be done out-with the Bill with the power that the right hon. Gentleman has under the 1948 Act.

Mr. Maclay: Mr. Maclayindicated assent.

Mr. Ross: That is quite irrelevant to the Amendment. We can all accept what the right hon. Gentleman has said and thank him very much for it. Now we can return to consideration of the merits of the Amendment. What chance will there be of continuing marginal production grants after 1962, that is, after the three years for which consideration has been promised? It is the existence of this limitation that led the Scottish


National Farmers' Union to organise a marginal farm conference recently.
I would quote the considered remarks in the 17th January, 1959, issue of the Kilmarnock Standard,an illustrious local newspaper with a very illustrous agricultural contributor. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) has pointed out, that contributor happens to be a Conservative member of the County Council, vice-convenor of the Ayr County Council and a leading expert on agriculture in Scotland whose technical advice is sought by the Department. I do not know anyone on the Government side who knows more about agriculture than Mr. William Young, of Skerrington Mains. He said:
The N.F.U. marginal land conference appears to have been a resounding success. Not that it may have brought out anything new, not merely because it displayed a most remarkable unanimity, but principally because speakers from every area of the Union, from the Shetland Islands to the Borders, produced facts and figures in support of their contentions that the M.A.P. assistance should be continued.
Most of those farmers are represented in this House, not on this side but on the Government side. What have those hon. Gentlemen done about it? The hon. Member for Argyll, fresh from the hustings and with the whole spirit of revolt and determination to stand up for the farmers in the area—I believe he was chairman of the branch of the N.F.U. in his area—

Mr. Noble: And I still am.

Mr. Ross: The hon. Gentleman still is in that position—yet he thanks the Government. He will not be for long. When we consider the number of farmers in Central Ayrshire affected, and their sons, daughters and wives—the hon. Member is leaving the Chamber.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Is my hon. Friend aware that the hon. Member will rescue the position for the next General Election by saying, "Vote Tory and get your posterior kicked"?

Mr. Ross: He need not wait until the next election, but can join us in the Lobby tonight.
I wonder whether the unanimity of the farmers has led the Government to take this action. Some people were surprised to learn that this time the Government

were opposed to Scottish landowners. It may be that that did it. Let us be under no delusion about what Scottish landowners are after. Their concern is rent. They are concerned with many farms marginal in character which have changed hands in the last dozen years let or sold which will have almost immediately to be revalued. The M.A.P. assistance will have to be on a very different level. Lord Howard de Walden has had, I think, more effect in respect of what he thinks he will lose in annual rent than the farmers in Ayrshire who may be his tenants.
I sincerely hope that hon. Members opposite will not give up the fight. If they are to allow the smaller men who are not to get assistance under Clause 1 to lose on the average 10 to 15 per cent. of their net income hon. Members opposite are not worthy of the name of Scottish representatives. They have only one duty and it is a principle to which they have been committed in all that they have said to the electorate; and that goes, too, in respect of the youngest man of the lot who came to us recently from East Aberdeenshire (Mr. Wolrige-Gordon). It is not to let them down, but to vote for this Amendment.
I hope that the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson), who is a hard-headed man, will not be swayed by the irrelevant speech we have heard today about something which is being done outwith the Bill. After that is done the Bill will remain and the hon. Member has been in Parliament long enough to know what will happen. If he allows this to go, these words will remain in the Bill and what he fears might happen will happen after 1962. I suggest that we vote for the Amendment and I hope we shall have some accession of strength from the so-called fighters for agricultural freedom on the benches opposite.

Sir Colin Thornton-Kemsley: The hon. Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) called the concession made by my right hon. Friend "flashy political window dressing," but we on this side of the Committee regard it as political realism, which we welcome. I think its value now lies in the opportunity which this one year's


stay of execution gives the Government— [Interruption.]I chose my words carefully. The opportunity this one year's stay of execution gives the Government is to study all the implications of the withdrawal of the marginal agricultural production scheme.

Mr. Ross: Why did they not do it before?

Sir C. Thornton-Kemsley: I cannot answer for the Government; I can only say what I hope they are going to do. On both sides of the Committee I think we can all agree on certain things. One hon. Member after another has spoken of the importance of marginal farming in the national economy. It replaces land lost to agriculture in other ways. Marginal farms are our next line of reserve to good agricultural land which so often is taken for building, for housing development, school playing fields, roads, airfields and so on. It assists the maintenance and expansion of agriculture on the lines laid down in the White Paper at the time of the 1958 Annual Review, which I have with me but do not propose to quote in view of the lateness of the hour.
We all ought to recognise that the assistance which has been given in Scotland to marginal farms has resulted in a new look and a new life for something like 12,000 to 13,000 agricultural holdings in the Highlands and upland areas of the North. We are all well aware that since M.A.P. was introduced, as my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan) and others have said, other help has been introduced which benefits the marginal farm. That other help and the fact that store cattle and mutton from the hills are selling well today in my view justifies some reduction in the scale and scope of marginal aid, but I do not think it justifies its withdrawal altogether.
What I hope will emerge from the year's study which I hope the Government are to undertake, and the new look which they are going to direct towards marginal farms and marginal assistance generally, is that it will result in some sort of selective assistance where that is most required by the marginal agricultural producer. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for South Angus that in the light of the world's cereal situation

there is no longer the need for marginal farms to grow oats unless they can be grown in great abundance and relatively economically. I think we can ease off the encouragement to cereal production on marginal farms. But by contrast the need for beef store cattle is as great or even greater than it has ever been.
Marginal agricultural production in Scotland, running at the full extent it reached in the current agricultural year, is estimated to cost only £1·21 million; that is for the whole marginal agricultural production scheme. Yet the ploughing-up subsidy in Scotland, strangely enough, is estimated at exactly twice that amount, £2·42 million a year. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness (Mr. N. McLean) that we ought to look at the ploughing-up subsidy. If we want to cut down anything, that is the sort of thing we should reduce and allow some of the money which goes to the ploughing up scheme to be spent on selective assistance to marginal farms.

7.0 p.m.

Mr. John Taylor: I had, unfortunately, to leave the Chamber while the Secretary of State made his statement, but I gathered immediately I came back that it was one of some importance. However, I confess to being puzzled because when I return to the precise and literal meaning of the Amendment I find myself in some procedural difficulty.
The first Amendment we are discussing seeks to leave out the words, "not exceeding three years." The Secretary of State has asked us to reject that Amendment, but suggests an Amendment which has the effect of leaving out three years. It has the effect of making it four years. He is asking his hon. Friends to vote against this Amendment and yet has stated that it no longer has any effect.

Mr. Maclay: I can well understand that the hon. Member had good reason for not being in the Chamber when I spoke, but that is not the effect of what I said, that three years become four. What I said was that it would produce four cropping seasons for M.A.P. grant. That is not the same thing.

Mr. Taylor: I appreciate that. I still think, however, that it makes nonsense of the present wording of the Bill and also


of the following Amendment, which suggests the year 1962 as the outside limit of the maximum grant, whereas, in fact, it would be 1963. I cannot see how anyone logically or reasonably can oppose these Amendments when they are taken to a Division.
Listening to all the spate of speeches and reading the OFFICIAL REPORT of the Committee proceedings upstairs, it seems to me that our Scottish Ministers have allowed themselves to be out-argued by accepting that this part of the Bill should apply to Scotland. One feels that had there been a separate Scottish Bill this part would never have been in, certainly not in its present form, certainly not with these dates and time limits, certainly not with these acreage limits, certainly not without any reference to the quality of marginality, and certainly a number of other arguments, qualifications, reasons, which apply so strongly in Scotland and make our case so overwhelmingly clear as it has been made this evening.
After a few years in Parliament one notices that there are occasions when a Government, having seen they have been mistaken and having gone so far to make concessions to attempt to meet the case half way, would be much wiser—and, when they do so, are much wiser—to concede the point which has been made on both sides with emphasis and logic. It seems that this is one of the occasions where, with credit to themselves, they could accept the case as it stands without any sacrifice of principle. It is a small matter on the whole in comparison with the major part of the Bill. I hope that even now the Government will be able to go that one step further and to accept these Amendments and still watch the situation.
If it is necessary to make changes it is just as easy, and very much better, to make those changes in the status quothan to say, opposed as they are by the whole farming community of Scotland, "We will see whether the farming community is proved right and then make the changes." They should leave it as it is and, if it is found possible by adjusting ploughing-up grants—I support what has been said from both sides of the Committee on that—to pay for those changes. That would be a better, more sensible and statesmanlike way of approaching the problem.

Mr. John MacLeod: I think it was a pity that this Bill and the M.A.P. grants should have been so closely mixed up. That certainly confused a great many farmers in the first instance and I think it was a mistake by the Government. However, I certainly welcome the concession made in the statement by the Secretary of State today because I hope it means that he has taken note of all the representations which have been made to him.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Only those by the landlords.

Mr. MacLeod: Do not talk nonsense; they have been made very widely and many of my constituents are seriously worried about the matter.
There is no doubt that in my constituency, a Highland constituency, great use has been made of M.A.P. That little addition has meant a great deal, particularly in the remote area where transport charges mean an increased burden on those benefiting from M.A.P. I hope my right hon. Friend will not only assess, but review the situation, certainly in the Highland areas, in respect of hill farmers who have benefited.
For social reasons alone we must make up our minds. I think that the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) was right—[An HON. MEMBER: "He is always right."] He is not always right, but he was right when he asked how much we were justified in pouring money into areas which are not economic but where we have to do that for social reasons. In remote areas agriculture is our main industry and in certain parts of my constituency it is the only industry. It is very important that we should help people living in those areas. I do not think that the Secretary of State has fully appreciated the implications of doing away with this grant. I hope that this is not only another year of life for the grant, but that he will seriously review it and give us another statement in eight months' time.

Mr. T. Fraser: It is some comfort to me to have heard hon. Members today saying that the money for this could easily have been found by making some reduction in the ploughing-up grants. I was very pleased to hear the excellent speech of the hon. Member for Inverness (Mr. N. McLean), supported in


some measure by the hon. Member for Ross and Cromarty (Mr. John MacLeod). It is within the recollection of some hon. Members that when the Bill came before the House in 1952, and on every occasion when we have had a scheme since, I have said that ploughing-up grants in many parts of the country were a plain waste of public money. Of course money could be taken from the ploughing grants and devoted to this purpose at no cost to the Exchequer.
What I principally want to say is that the Secretary of State has misled the Committee. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Yes, because he has not made a concession.

Mr. Maclay: I did not say that I had.

Mr. Fraser: I did not say that the Secretary of State said that he had made a concession but that he had misled the Committee. How many hon. Members have thanked the right hon. Member for a concession? Now he says he did not make a concession.

Mr. Maclay: Let us get the words straight. I was trying to disentangle whether the hon. Member was accusing me of deliberately misleading the Committee. What I said has not misled the Committee. I made a statement and do not remember using the word "concession" at all.

Mr. Fraser: The right hon. Gentleman did not make a concession. He could not make a concession about the time M.A.P. will run without an amendment of the Bill. The Bill says that the scheme will run for a period of not more than three years and will terminate in July, 1962. May I take those hon. Members who have been falling over themselves and saying "Thank you" to the right hon. Gentleman with me in tracing the matter backwards? If the last year of the scheme is 1962, the second year of the scheme would be 1961 and the first year would be 1960. There was the assumption that the present scheme would be operating this year, which is 1959. It had never occurred to me for a moment that the grant in respect of the cultivations which are being carried out under the existing law and qualifying under the existing law would be with-

drawn after this Bill becomes an Act of Parliament.
What the Secretary of State is now saying is that if he had not made this statement on this Amendment this afternoon those farmers who had made their plans for this year's operations would not have got the grant under the existing law. That would have been a monstrous position. It had never occurred to me that the grants would not be paid in the year 1959.

Mr. Maclay: The hon. Gentleman will remember that I said that publicity was given that the scheme would come to an end at the end of last August. He seems to have missed that.

Mr. Fraser: I certainly did miss the proposition that the scheme would come to an end in 1958. Indeed, whoever drafted this Bill must have missed it, too, because the Bill says that the three-year scheme which the Secretary of State now says is to start in 1959 shall end in 1962. Why not 1961? If the first year is 1959, the second year must be 1960 and the third year 1961. Why does the Bill mention 1962? I do not say the right hon. Gentleman has done so intentionally, but he has certainly misled the Committee. I challenge any hon. Member on either side of the Committee to say that he believed when we were originally considering this Bill that the existing law which has not been repealed had come to an end.

Sir C. Thornton-Kemsley: May I remind the hon. Gentleman of the Statutory Instrument No. 1396 of 1957 entitled "Agricultural Grants, Goods and Services. The Marginal Agricultural Production (Scotland) Scheme, 1957." Paragraph 2 says:
… there shall be substituted a reference to the 31st day of August, 1958.
The Explanatory Note says:
This scheme extends the time within which offers of assistance may be made under the Marginal Agricultural Production (Scotland) Scheme, 1949, by one year to 31st August, 1958.

Mr. Fraser: I do not understand the relevance of that intervention. All of those provisions are made for a period and have a terminal date written into them. I think hon. Members opposite must be guilty of some hypocrisy if they knew that this was coming to an end


and they never said a word against it having been brought to an end, and are now grateful for an indication that it is to be continued for another year. Why should they be grateful for something which they had already accepted? Of course, they had not accepted it at all, because they did not know about it. None of us believed that the operations which were being carried on were not going to attract the grants to which farmers were entitled under the 1948 Statute.
The justification for the Secretary of State continuing this grant for another year, albeit in a modified form, was that plans had already been made for the cultivations and farm operations in 1959. So the right hon. Gentleman feels obliged to continue the grant. That can mean only one thing, namely, that he believed that the farmers were prepared and made their plans for 1959 in the expectation that the grant would be paid. Do hon. Members opposite who say they knew about this challenge that statement? The Secretary of State has made this so-called concession because the farmers had made their plans for the 1959 operations. Did they not make those plans on the assumption that the Marginal Agricultural Production grant would be available to them? Of course they did.

Mr. Maclay: I am sorry to have to repeat my previous speech, but apparently it is essential that I should do so. I could repeat my exact words if I had a moment or two to find them.

Mr. Willis: We should prefer it in the right hon. Gentleman's own language.

Mr. Maclay: It is in my own language. I do not think there is any need to make that kind of remark. I said in my opening speech that they must have known that the previous scheme was coming to an end, and I think some of them assumed that there would be some modified form of assistance available and they made their plans accordingly.

7.15 p.m.

Mr. Fraser: The Secretary of State has recognised that farmers made their plans on the assumption that M.A.P. would be available. So he says, "I feel obliged to continue with the grant for another year." Quite apart from the proposition that the farmers made their plans believing that the grant would be available,

the logic of what the right hon. Gentleman has now said is that he had assumed that the farmers would have reduced their cultivations and operations in 1959 if they fully understood that M.A.P. would not be available to them. Is that not so?
But then have not those who argued for the discontinuance of M.A.P. argued that it is no longer necessary as an inducement? Now the Secretary of State has made it quite clear by the only kind of deduction that one is entitled to apply in this case that he had assumed that those farmers who had hitherto enjoyed M.A.P. grants would have reduced their cultivations in 1959. He must be making the assumption that they will further reduce their operations in 1960. Our complaint is that this is leading to the land being put out of agricultural use. That is the complaint of the National Farmers' Union, of the landowners and of everyone who has made any study of this subject at all.
It is a strange attitude for hon. Members opposite to adopt, to say that they are grateful for this additional year— that is what the hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Sir C. Thornton-Kemsley) said—for which they did not ask. He does not believe in it in any case, because he thinks the scheme should have come to an end, but he is grateful because, he says, it will give time to rethink the question. Why should the Secretary of State be thanked by his hon. Friends for throwing this whole industry into chaos and then for undertaking to have a look at the chaos that he has created?
If the Secretary of State wished, he could modify the M.A.P. scheme at any time. The particulars of the M.A.P. scheme are not written into statute. The amount of money is not written into statute. The different grants for the different degree of marginality are not written into statute. These things are all subject to the discretion of the Secretary of State. He could modify the marginal agricultural production scheme any year—every year if he wished. He could go ahead with his discussions with the N.F.U. He could do his re-thinking all the time. As a matter of fact, I think he is obliged by Statute to continue re-thinking all the time.
I used to have these discussions with the N.F.U. and the various branches. The


hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson) once came to see me because we had had to reduce the grants to some of his farming constituents. We had taken the advice available to us and had formed the view that the fertility of the land had so improved as a result of the grants that had been given, the degree of marginality had grown less and, therefore, the grant had to be reduced.
The hon. Member said "Is this the reward that we get for our hard work?" to which our reply was "No, this is only evidence that your income from other sources has improved, because your land is less marginal than it was as a result of the operations that you carried out with our assistance. That is how this scheme works." Hon. Members opposite who claim to have some knowledge of this matter because they are farmers do not seem to realise that. The scheme differs from one county to another. The Secretary of State and the executive committees have much more discretion in the operation of this subsidy than in any other agricultural subsidy. Hon. Members who think that we should use the next eight months or a year in re-thinking and should introduce M.A.P. in another form either do not know what they are talking about—I say that advisedly—or they are misleading their constituents. I hope that it is the former.

Sir J. Duncan: Is the hon. Member seriously suggesting that any farmer with over 150 acres is in receipt or in expectation of receipt of M.A.P.?

Mr. Fraser: I do not want the hon. Member to divert me from what I was saying. I said that any hon. Member who says that this period of grace should be used for rethinking is either talking in ignorance or is deliberately misleading. I hope that it is the former.
The Secretary of State will either confirm or contradict what I have said. He is perfectly free to rethink on this matter and modify the scheme whenever he wishes. If hon. Members opposite consider that marginal farmers have a problem which is worthy of attention and which should earn support from central funds which is not available to the generality of farmers, let them not decide by

their vote that the kind of assistance that those farmers receive should come to an end in 1962. Once the Secretary of State and hon. Members opposite know what they want for the future of marginal farmers in Scotland, that would be the time to come along with a Bill to discontinue the existing statutory provisions and to bring forward a Bill to withdraw M.A.P. grants as we know them now.
The Under-Secretary said in Committee that the Government would have another look at this matter. It was said that they know there is a problem which they will continue to examine, and let us use this period of grace to examine the problem. Let the Government consider whether the present M.A.P. system is satisfactory, or let the Secretary of State modify it in any way he wishes. He has power to do that. If he thinks that the scheme should have a different name, let him determine what it should be and come forward with the appropriate legislation when he is ready. He should not, however, disturb the present form of assistance without serious consideration.
I hoped that the hon. Member for Argyll (Mr. M. Noble) would return to the Chamber before I resumed my seat. He chided us on this side with having taken away subsidies from those same people. I deny that emphatically. I remember our discussions with the N.F.U. at the time. I do not know whether the hon. Member was then a farmer in Argyll or an official of the N.F.U. If he was, he should have known the position. If he did not know the position, he ought not to have misled the House as he did. At that time the N.F.U. of Scotland said that the hon. Gentleman, who is a hill farmer, was not getting the calf subsidy. His union said that he was not getting the benefit of the scheme, but today he said that he was.
At that time the union told me that the hill farmers always sold calves off the farm before they were earmarked and before they earned the subsidy, and it was the farmer on the lush land who was to fatten the calves who got the subsidy. It was said that the subsidy should be discontinued and another way found to help the hill farmer. But the hon. Member must know that we agreed a global sum for what we thought should be the income of the farmers, and within the global sum


we thought out what kinds of subsidy should be paid and what minimum guaranteed prices should be given in respect of different commodities. The granting or withdrawal of the calf subsidy did not make any difference to the Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Mr. M. Noble: What the hon. Gentleman says may or may not be true. I was not present at any conference he had with the N.F.U. It certainly is not true to say that no hill farmer received the calf subsidy, because many of them did, including myself. But if in withdrawing this scheme the N.F.U. had other plans for helping the hill farmer, it would have been useful to us to have had the benefit of them, but we received nothing extra.

Mr. Fraser: I know that he is a very new Member, but the hon. Gentleman ought to have a better memory. Has he never heard of the Livestock Rearing Act, 1951? Was not that Act calculated to help the marginal farmers of Scotland? Of course it was. If I said that no hill farmer ever received the calf subsidy, then I was misleading the Committee. I hope, however, that I did not say that. The N.F.U. told us that the subsidy was not going to the hill farmer. [AN HON. MEMBER: "To the marginal farmer."] There are many marginal Members in the Committee this evening.
The argument for removing the time limit on the payment of M.A.P. grants is not a request for any more money from the Exchequer. We are not asking for more money from the Exchequer. We say that the money that goes into agriculture should be more sensibly distributed. If subsidies are to be withdrawn, let them be the subsidies for which there is not an urgent need. Let the Government reduce the ploughing grants. It is interesting that many farmers who get the benefit of ploughing grants but not M.A.P. grants have been saying in recent times that the ploughing grants should be reduced and the money utilised to continue M.A.P. grants. I hope that that will be done.
The hon. Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan) said that he was delighted that the Secretary of State had given this stay of execution. His constituents, however, are not so' silly as to

be pleased that they are to be executed in 1960 instead of 1959 or 1959 instead of 1958. The hon. Member, too, was one of those who thought that we should have an opportunity to consider what other help should be given to marginal farmers. If hon. Members think that help should be given to farmers of this type of land, then they should support the Amendments. If they vote against them, they will be guilty of voting in favour of discontinuing M.A.P. before we know what other measures can be introduced to take its place.

Mr. Maclay: I have listened with the greatest attention and interest to the debate. I repeat, however, what I said earlier, namely, that it seems to me that hon. Members opposite and the Government have the same objective. Certain assumptions which are not proved have been made by some hon. Members about the workings of our proposals. We are all concerned about marginal and hill land. There are, however, differences of view in the Committee and outside about what will be the effects of our proposals.
The right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) specifically asked how many farms we thought would go out of existence and what would be the effect on production. The short answer is that I am not convinced that any farms will necessarily go out of existence. There is no evidence to show that they will. What hon. Gentlemen have failed to realise is that one is not necessarily tied to one method of working one's farm for all time, and, if there is an alteration in method of subsidy, there may be other methods of working one's farm.
It has been said that there will be a serious effect on beef, on beef stores in particular. We are, I know, all concerned about beef stores, but, equally, I have been told repeatedly by the farming community and others in recent years that the trouble with the world and ourselves is a shortage of beef, and there must be an extremely active market in beef coming along. I am not forecasting; I am merely basing my remarks on what I have been told. Let us, therefore, get rid of the idea that something absolutely cataclysmic will happen to farming if things go along the lines I have indicated.

7.30 p.m.

Mr. Woodburn: I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman has given us an assurance that the calculations of his Department show that what is proposed will not lead to farms going out of existence. But two or three of his hon. Friends today have justified his action by saying that, during the war, we spread the margin up the hills and we spread the margin out to farms which were not economic, and they welcomed this proposal on the ground that it would get rid of uneconomic farms. They challenged us to say whether we wanted to maintain uneconomic farms.

Mr. Maclay: There may be uneconomic crops. I listened to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan) with intense interest. He obviously knew precisely what he was talking about.

Mr. T. Fraser: He obviously did not know what he was talking about.

Mr. Maclay: He plainly knew very much what he was talking about and put forward some very interesting proposals which are well worth watching and considering.
I do not want to let the debate on these Amendments end on the suggestion that something fantastic is happening. It is not. There is no question about that. It is one particular type of assistance which has been modified and which is to come to an end at a certain time under the proposals in the Bill. I shall not go over again, because I have had to do so several times in interjections, precisely what I said about continuation for this year. I think the implications of that are fully understood.

Mr. Ross: The right hon. Gentleman made the announcement about continuation for this year. Was he, in this case, speaking for England and Wales as well as Scotland? Is the continuation to apply only to Scotland?

Mr. Maclay: Yes, it applies only to Scotland, as I think the hon. Gentleman knows. There are separate Scottish schemes for the M.A.P. grants.
My hon. Friend the Member for Inverness (Mr. N. McLean) asked what I meant when I said that I should be looking at the matter again. The words I used

were that "this course of action will also give further opportunity to the Government for assessing the position." At another part of my earlier speech I used words which had been used previously by my noble Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State, that it is clearly the Government's intention and duty and desire to keep the closest watch on all the farming situation as it develops, particularly, for example, in the beef and sheep industries in relation to successive annual price reviews.
What I think my hon. Friend was wondering was whether I would say positively, in so many words, that, in the course of the months ahead, I would reexamine precisely what would happen with regard to M.A.P. It must be clear from what I have said that we are watching how we can, in the best possible way, give effective help to the marginal farms. As we study the matter, we will do whatever we feel to be right. I still feel that the arguments against our proposals have been over-emphasised but, if it should even prove that they are, in effect, right, and it is true that production of certain types will alter and people may even go out of existence as farmers on a scale which would be unacceptable —one can never be certain about every individual farm in the country, of course —if all these things occur, then, of course, one will be examining the whole thing, and some kind of M.A.P. concept may be right—

Mr. Emrys Hughes: It is the right hon. Gentleman's job, anyway.

Mr. Maclay: Of course it is. I should warn the hon. Gentleman the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes), referring to his speech, that he should be very careful not to make another like it, or I shall make another one in Cumnock.
I hope that I have made it clear to my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness and to others who are understandably concerned about it that my words were very deliberately chosen in my earlier speech, and that in any examination of the problem of marginal farms we shall go on, as we always do, with the idea of seeing how we may be certain to make the best possible use of the land in question.
Not very many specific questions were asked of me. I think that I have dealt with those which were put. I end by saying, as I said at the end of my opening remarks, that I do not imagine that what I have said will necessarily mean that some of those supporting the Amendments would wish to withdraw them. I had hoped that they would, and I still hope that they will, but I do not wish to be under any illusion or try to mislead the Committee by suggesting that what I have done is a modification which would meet those Amendments. Obviously, it is not. However, the principle of what I have said shows that we are completely concerned, as we always have been, about getting the best possible results for Scottish farming. We are very concerned about marginal farms and very concerned to see that proper use of that resource of Scotland is made.
With reference to something said by the hon. Gentleman the Member for West Lothian (Mr. J. Taylor), I will say that in the whole working out of the Bill, we have been thinking very carefully indeed about the Scottish implications from the word, "Go". We have not dragged at anybody's heels. That old charge has been made for far too long. I still think that we can, through the various methods I described in my opening speech, in a continuing study of the problem, make certain that the best use is made of this part of our Scottish country about which hon. Members have expressed so much concern.

Mr. T. Fraser: The right hon. Gentleman has not answered a rather important question which I put. Does he not have power under the existing Statute to modify the marginal agricultural production scheme in any way he will, to reduce the amount of money made available to farmers under the scheme? Does he not have all the power in the world to do this at the present time?

Mr. Maclay: I am not at all clear as to the relevance of that.

Mr. Fraser: This is the one opportunity we have of taking a decision on a matter of very great importance to the farmers of Scotland. The right hon. Gentleman says that he does not see the relevance of my question. I will explain it once again.

His hon. Friends who support him, who said that they will feel obliged to support him against the Amendments today, in view of the statement he has made, have pleaded with him to consider what alternative, modified scheme to help marginal agricultural production will be available or will be worked out in the future. They are giving him eight or twelve months to look at all this and bring forward his alternative scheme.
Those hon. Members have assumed that there is a scheme under Statute which must be adhered to and that it would take a new Act of Parliament to bring about any modifications. I assert that that is not so. That is a false conception. The right hon. Gentleman could modify the M.A.P. scheme for Scotland next year to provide that the total amount would be not £1·21 million but £600,000. He could do that. He must do something like that. He has power to do it at any time. He could make it £500,000. He could reduce it still more. He could cut out a great many farmers who are now receiving grants under the existing powers. He could, with the greatest of ease under the existing powers, reduce the number of farmers receiving grants by 25 per cent.
The right hon. Gentleman may smile, but I regard this as extremely important. He may not agree. Under the M.A.P. scheme, he gives a grant to farmers in respect of particular cultivations. He gives a grant in support of fertilisers, feeding stuffs, seeds, and what not. He could decide to cut some of those things out of his existing scheme if he wanted to, or decide to reduce the percentage grant in respect of those things. He can do all those things under the existing powers. Am I right in making those assertions or am I not? If I am not right, will the right hon. Gentleman tell us how far he is limited in modifying or adjusting the schemes at the present time?

Mr. Maclay: As the hon. Gentleman knows, the short answer is that these schemes are made annually, and there is considerable flexibility under them. With the greatest respect, although I concede that, from a political debating point of view, he can try to make that point relevant, I cannot see that it is relevant to my own argument.

Question put,That "not exceeding three years" stand part of the Clause:—

The Committee divided:Ayes 202, Noes 176.

Division No. 20.]
AYES
[7.41 p.m.


Agnew, Sir Peter
Grimston, Hon. John (St. Albans)
Morrison, John (Salisbury)


Aitken, W. T.
Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)
Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles


Anstruther-Gray, Major Sir William
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Nabarro, G. D. N.


Armstrong, C. W.
Gurden, Harold
Nairn, D. L. S.


Ashton, H.
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Nicholson, Sir Godfrey (Farnham)


Atkins, H. E.
Hare, Rt. Hon. J. H.
Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. &amp; Chr'ch)


Baldwin, Sir Archer
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)
Noble, Michael (Argyll)


Balniel, Lord
Harris, Reader (Heston)
Nugent, G. R. H.


Barter, John
Harrison, A. B. C. (Maldon)
O'Neill, Hn. Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)


Batsford, Brian
Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.


Baxter, sir Beverley
Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel
Page, R. G.


Beamish, Col. Tufton
Heath, Rt. Hon. E. R. G.
Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale)


Bell, Philip (Bolton, E.)
Hicks-Beach, Maj. W. W.
Peel, W. J.


Bell, Ronald (Bucks, S.)
Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)
Peyton, J. W. W.


Bevins, J. R. (Toxteth)
Hill, John (S. Norfolk)
Pickthorn, K. W. M.


Bidgood, J. C.
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Pike, Miss Mervyn


Biggs-Davison, J. A.
Hobson, John(Warwick &amp; Leam'gt'n)
Pilkington, Capt. R. A.


Bingham, Ft. M.
Holland-Martin, C. J.
Pitt, Miss E. M,


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Hope, Lord John
Pott, H. P.


Bishop, F. P.
Hornby, R. P.
Price, Henry (Lewisham; W.)


Black, C. w.
Horobin, Sir Ian
Ramsden, J. E.


Bossom, Sir Alfred
Howard, Gerald (Cambridgeshire)
Rawlinson, Peter


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. J. A.
Howard, Hon. Greville (St. Ives)
Redmayne, M.


Boyle, Sir Edward
Hudson, W. R. A. (Hull, N.)
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Braine, B. R.
Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J.
Remnant, Hon. P.


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W. H.
Hughes-Young, M. H. C.
Renton, D. L. M.


Browne, J. Nixon (Craigton)
Hurd, A. R.
Ridsdale, J. E.


Bryan, P.
Hutchison, Michael Clark(E'b'gh, S.)
Rippon, A, G. F.


Burden, F. F. A.
Hutchison, Sir Ian Clark (E'b'gh,W.)
Roper, Sir Harold


Butcher, Sir Herbert
Iremonger, T. L.
Ropner, Col, Sir Leonard


Butler, Rt. Hn. R. A.(Saffron Walden)
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Scott-Miller, Cmdr. R.


Carr, Robert
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)
Sharples, R. C.


Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portstmth, W.)
Jennings, Sir Roland (Hallam)
Smithers, Peter (Winchester)


Cooper-Key, E. M.
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Smyth, Brig. Sir John (Norwood)


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Speir, R. M.


Corfield, F. V.
Jones, Rt. Hon. Aubrey (Hall Green)
Spens, Rt. Hn. Sir P. (Kens'gt'n, S.)


Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne)
Joseph, Sir Keith
Stanley, Capt. Hon. Richard


Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.
Kaberry, D.
Stevens, Geoffrey


Crowder, Sir John (Finchley)
Kerby, Capt. H. B.
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Currie, G. B. H.
Kerr, Sir Hamilton
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Kimball, M.
Storey, S.


Deedes, W. F.
Lagden, G. W.
Stuart, Rt. Hon. James (Moray)


de Ferranti, Basil
Lambton, Viscount
Studholme, Sir Henry


Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA.
Lancaster, Col. C. G.
Summers, Sir Spencer


Drayson, G. B.
Langford-Holt, J. A.
Teeling, W.


Duncan, Sir James
Leavey, J. A.
Temple, John M.


Duthie, W. S.
Legge-Bourke, MaJ. E. A. H.
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Eden, J. B. (Bournemouth, West)
Lindsay, Hon. James (Devon, N.)
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Elliott,R.W.(Ne'castle upon Tyne. N.)
Linstead, Sir H. N.
Thompson, R. (Croydon, S.)


Errington, Sir Eric
Lloyd, Maj. Sir Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin


Farey-Jones, F. W.
Loveys, Walter H.
Tiley, A. (Bradford, W.)


Fell, A.
Lucas, Sir Jocelyn (Portsmouth, S.)
Tilney, John (Wavertree)


Finlay, Graeme
Lucas, P. B. (Brentford &amp; Chiswick)
Turner, H. F. L.


Fletcher-Cooke, C.
Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Freeth, Denzil
Mackeson, Brig. Sir Harry
Vane, W. M. F.


Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.
Maclay, Rt. Hon. John
Vickers, Miss Joan


Garner-Evans, E. H.
McLean, Neil (Inverness)
Vosper, Rt. Hon. D. F.


George, J. C. (Pollok)
Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Gibson-Watt, D.
Maddan, Martin
Walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Derek


Glover, D.
Maitland, Cdr. J. F. W.(Horncastle)
Webster, David


Godber, J. B.
Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.
Whitelaw, W. S. I.


Goodhart, Philip
Markham, Major Sir Frank
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Gower, H. R.
Marlowe, A. A. H.
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Graham, Sir Fergus
Marples, Rt. Hon. A. E.
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Grant, Rt. Hon. W. (Woodside)
Mathew, R.
Wolrige-Gordon, P.


Grant-Ferris, Wg Cdr. R. (Nantwich)
Mawby, R. L.
Woollam, John Victor


Green, A.
Maydon, Lt.-Comdr. S. L. C.



Gresham Cooke, R.
Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:




Mr. Legh and Colonel J. H. Harrison.




NOES


Abse, Leo
Balfour, A.
Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.


Ainsley, J. W.
Bence, C. R. (Dunbartonshire, E.)
Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S.W.)


Albu, A. H.
Blackburn, F.
Bowen, E. R. (Cardigan)


Allen, Arthur (Bosworth)
Blenkinsop, A.
Bowles, F. G.


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Blyton, W. R.
Boyd, T. C.


Awbery, S. S.
Boardman, H.
Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)


Bacon, Miss Alice
Bonham Carter, Mark
Brown, Thomas (Ince)




Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Paton, John


Champion, A. J.
Irving, Sydney (Dartford)
Pearson, A.


Chetwynd, G. R.
Janner, B.
Peart, T. F.


Cliffe, Michael
Jay, Rt. Hon. D. P. T.
Pentland, N.


Clunie, J.
Jeger, George (Goole)
Plummer, Sir Leslie


Collick, P. H. (Birkenhead)
Jeger, Mrs. Lena (Holbn &amp; St.Pncs, S.)
Popplewell, E.


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Jones, Rt. Hon. A. Creech(Wakefield)
Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)


Cove, W. G.
Jones, David (The Hartlepools)
Probert, A. R.


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Jones, Jack (Rotherham)
Rankin, John


Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Rhodes, H.


Davies, Rt. Hon.Clement(Montgomery)
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)
Robens, Rt. Hon. A.


Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.)
Key, Rt. Hon, C. W.
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Davies, Harold (Leek)
King, Dr. H. M.
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)



Lawson, G. M.
Robertson, Sir David


Davies, Stephen (Merthyr)
Ledger, R, J.
Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)


Deer, G.
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Ross, William


Diamond, John
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)
Short, E. W.


Dodds, N. N.
Lindgren, G. S.
Silverman, Julius (Aston)


Dugdale, Rt. Hn. John (W. Brmwch)
Logan, D. G.
Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)


Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson
Skeffington, A. M.


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
McAlister, Mrs. Mary
Slater, Mrs. H. (Stoke, N.)


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
McCann, J.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)


Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)
MacDermot, Niall
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank


Evans, Edward (Lowestoft)
McGhee, H. G.
Sparks, J. A.


Fernyhough, E.
McKay, John (Wallsend)
Spriggs, Leslie


Fitch, Alan
McLeavy, Frank
Stewart, Michael (Fulham)


Fletcher, Eric
MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)
Stones, W. (Consett)


Forman, J. C.
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Mahon, Simon
Summersklll, Rt. Hon. E.


Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)


George, Lady Megan Lloyd(Car'then)
Mann, Mrs. Jean
Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)


Gibson, C. W.
Mayhew, C. P.
Tomney, F.


Gooch, E. G
Mellish, R. J.



Grenfell, Rt. Hon. D. R.

Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn


Grey, C. F.
Messer, Sir F.
Viant, S. P.


Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Mikardo, Ian
Wade, D. W.


Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Mitchison, G. R.
Warbey, W. N.


Griffiths, William (Exchange)
Monslow, W.
Watkins, T. E.


Grimond, J.
Moody, A. S.
Wells, Peroy (Faversham)



Morrison, Rt. Hn. Herbert (Lewis'm, S.)
Wheeldon, W. E.


Hale, Leslie
Mort, D. L.
White, Henry (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Hamilton, W. W.
Moss, R.
Willey, Frederick


Hannan, W.
Moyle, A.
Williams, David (Neath)


Hastings, S.
Neal, Harold (Bolsover)
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Hayman, F. H.
Oliver, G. H.
Williams, Richard (Openshaw)


Holman, P.
Oram, A. E.
Willis, Eustace (Edinburgh, E.)


Howell, Charles (Perry Barr)
Oswald, T.
Winterbottom, Richard


Howell, Denis (All Saints)
Owen, W.J.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Hoy, J. H.
Paget, R. T.
Woof, R. E.


Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Paling, Rt. Hon. W. (Dearne Valley)
Yates, V. (Ladywood)


Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Palmer, A. M. F.
Zilliacus, K.


Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)



Hunter, A, E,
Pargiter, G. A.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Parker, J.
Mr. John Taylor and Mr. J. T. Price.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Bill reported, without A mendment; as amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.

Clause 1.—(SCHEMES FOR GRANTS FOR INCREASING EFFICIENCY OF SMALL FARM BUSINESSES.)

Mr. Frederick Willey: I beg to move, in page 1, line 7, after "grants", to insert:
which in some cases may be made repayable subject to such conditions as the Minister may determine".
We can claim a little ingenuity in draftsmanship in having succeeded in raising the point that we discussed in Standing Committee. In an earlier discussion today, it was clear that there is a sharp division between the two sides of the House on the question of co-

operation. We get a lot of lip-service from the Government about co-operation in agriculture. We do not get effective action and we know why. It is because the lobby of the middlemen is a very real lobby in the Conservative Party. So it is with regard to the question of credit that we are discussing on this Amendment.
Everyone who has studied agriculture knows that one of its urgent needs is better credit facilities. That is reaffirmed in the recent Report of the Grassland Utilisation Committee. We cannot get any effective action from the Government, because they are subject to the bankers' lobby. The bankers are not anxious that we should extend publicly the provision of credit to agriculture. I do not want to pursue this at length, because it was discussed in Standing Committee. It is, however, a matter of great regret that


although this was one of the matters discussed between the Government and the producers at the time the Government issued their White Paper on long-term assurances, still we have no action from the Government concerning agricultural credit.
In the Amendment, we are not suggesting that loans should be an alternative to grants. We believe, as does the National Farmers' Union, that the grants should be supplemented by provision in one form and another for loans. One of the major reasons for this is that we share the concern expressed by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), who said, with his usual stringency, that the Bill and the provision that the Government intend to make under it are inadequate.
As the House knows, the National Farmers' Union suggested that the husbandry grants should be supplemented by farm business loans. We made it clear in Standing Committee that we are not committing ourselves on the question of what interest there should be upon any such loans, but we would certainly argue that there is a case for preferential rates of interest. Because we share the views of the N.F.U. and the producers that the Government's proposals are inadequate, we believe that further provision should be made for loans to assist the small farmer.
The Government failed to persuade the National Farmers' Union that their proposals are adequate. As a result, the N.F.U. remains dissatisfied, and so do we. We have had a very inadequate reply from the Government so far. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary will remember that when we argued the case for provision by way of loan, one of the Government's arguments was that the advisory officers were not the best people to determine the creditworthiness of a farmer. This is not an argument that we can accept, because we are dealing here with a scheme to provide, quite properly, assistance to the small farmer, but at the expense of the other farmers.
If the advisory officers can give advice that results in the taking of other people's money and giving it to the small farmer, they must be equally able to advise about giving loans to such a farmer. If we are

concerned with the relationship between the advisory officer and the farmer, the provision of a loan should assist that relationship. If we are to put our trust and confidence in someone, I can think of no better way of doing it than by loan.
The Minister knows quite well that he made a fool of himself when he expressed his views about this and he upset many farmers. I do not want to make too much of this, but, again, I remind the Minister, as I did in Standing Committee, that he said:
The sort of chap whom we are trying to help is not the sort of chap who likes to have loans, and I shall be very sorry for any successor of mine who tried to get the money back."—[OFFICIAL REPORT,Standing Committee A,25th November, 1958; c. 7.]
That gives the lie to the White Paper, which specifically argues that the purpose of the scheme is to make the small farmer more creditworthy and it is a vote of no confidence in the proposals which the Government are now making.
It is because, like the small farmers themselves, we are upset by this attitude of the Minister, betraying the fundamental approach of the Government that this is no more than a dole to the small farmer to alleviate matters for a few years, that we beg the Minister to reconsider the question of loans. If he would make provision for loans, he would show that he had more confidence in the proposed scheme that he has explained in his White Paper and he would show a more constructive and continuing regard for the small farmer.
For these reasons, I hope that the Minister will accept the Amendment in this rather modified form and make provision for the possibility of providing loans further to aid the small farmer.

Mr. M. Philips Price: I hope that the Minister will reconsider this matter, various aspects of which we discussed in Committee, when the Government and the Minister did not show any sign of approaching our point of view.
Two points can be stressed legitimately. One is that it is undesirable to leave small farmers who would benefit under the Bill, but who, possibly, would like to take loans rather than grants, to the fluctuations of the money market. We have seen great fluctuations in the last


eighteen months, with the Bank Rate up to 7 per cent. Ever since 1951, there have been fluctuations of various kinds.
There is a case for men in small business of this kind being given the opportunity by the' Government to meet their obligations under conditions of reasonable stability. That is why there is a case for giving them the opportunity to take loans on a stable basis, not subject to the fluctuations of the money market, if they so wish.
The other reason is that many—in fact, most—farmers will feel that if they make use of the facilities provided by the Bill, they will be affecting the possibilities of support for prices of agricultural produce, because, as is clear from the terms of the Bill, the support for this assistance will come out of the general fund for keeping prices stable by subsidies of various kinds. Many farmers will feel that they would prefer not to run that risk, but there is a case for having the conditions reasonably stable and not subject to the fluctuations of the money market.
I hope, therefore, that the Minister will reconsider the matter on the lines on which we on this side of the House have been pressing.

8.0 p.m.

Mr. Harold Davies: I sincerely hope that the Minister will listen to this side of the House on this point, because by means of the Amendment he can do something for those parts of Britain where there is marginal and difficult farming. In Committee I tried to make the point that encouragement outside even a scheme of grants might be given to small farmers. There are 1,710 farms of under 20 acres each in North Staffordshire, and among 1,340 of those in my area hundreds are farmed by men who by means of a small loan would be enabled to bring water supplies or electricity to their farms.
In many cases these small farmers do not ask the Electricity Board for a supply of electricity and do not install a tapped water supply because they cannot afford to do so. A loan for this purpose would encourage initiative. If huge loans can be given to people to enable them to stuff their houses with television sets, in the name of sanity why cannot we have a much more realistic approach to the provision of certain basic requirements for the benefit of the country as a whole?
Tens of thousands of small farmers in Britain, whom we so often decry, provide mountains of fresh food for the nation, and they produce it at times of crisis. These farmers should not be forgotten in the transitional periods. The Conservative Party talks a great deal about helping the small farmer. The Amendment provides the Government with an opportunity to give the help. The Minister has the power. All he needs is the courage to accept tonight an extension of the Bill, by means of the Amendment, which would bring about a vast improvement and would enable small farmers to obtain electricity and water supplies and provide small individual drainage schemes which might increase production by 25 per cent. I beg the Minister to consider this constructive Amendment.

Mr. John Hall: Although I would not altogether agree with the wording of the Amendment, there is something to be said for the proposal that a provision should be inserted in the Bill to enable the Minister to make loans available in certain circumstances. I understand from small farmers in my constituency that their main objection to grants is that they will come out of the global sum. I can also understand the Government's objection to having loans outside that total sum paid to farmers, because that increases total Treasury liability at any one time and there is no certainty in what year that loan element is likely to be reduced.
It should be made possible to make loans to farmers who may be outside the terms of the Bill because, although their acreage is right, their man-day calculation is wrong, which means that they have shown that they are efficient and that if they had made available to them money at a low rate of interest, or loans free of interest, they could still further increase productivity.
It might be asked why special facilities should be given to farmers, either interest-free or at an artificially low rate pf interest, when they are not made available to other forms of industry. The answer is quite simple. At the moment we feel it necessary, for the benefit of the nation as a whole and in order to encourage food production and ensure food supplies, to give special treatment to farmers to the tune of £350 million a year.

Mr. T. Williams: No.

Mr. Hall: I am subject to correction on the figure, but in any event it is a very large figure, and it is certainly a special form of assistance. If it is reasonable to pay support of that kind, we should not cavil at giving loan facilities at a special rate of interest where we think that they will increase productivity.
I do not know what amount of the food that we require in this country is met by home producers. I think that it is 60 per cent. But it may well be that in the next ten or twenty years the total amount of food requirement met by home producers may fall in relation to an increasing population and a not sufficiently rapid rise in agricultural production. Therefore, we should help not only the small farmers who are within the purview of the Bill but the efficient small farmers who, by their very efficiency, have put themselves outside its purview. Therefore, I should like to see my right hon. Friend take powers which would enable him to give help of this kind.

Mr. Hayman: I am glad that the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall) has supported the Amendment, and particularly the principle. His suggestion that there should be a low rate of interest or even an interest-free loan was excellent. I made the point in Committee that there is already a low interest rate which the State recognises, namely, the 2½per cent. rate of interest paid on Post Office Savings Bank accounts. That is something which the Minister might consider if he is prepared to accept the Amendment but does not want to give an interest-free loan.

Mr. Tudor Watkins: I also want to support the Amendment. No doubt the Minister has by now been advised about what was said in debate yesterday on the Electricity (Borrowing Powers) Bill, in the course of which my right hon. Friend the Member for Blyth (Mr. Robens) suggested that consideration should be given to the possibility of loans being made available to small farmers so that they might obtain more equipment for their farms, and particularly movable assets which would use more electricity. It was an admirable suggestion which was echoed by hon. Members on both sides of the House.
I want to support that suggestion in the hope that the Minister will deal with it favourably if not now, then in the near future. Ministers and hon. Members sometimes criticise farmers because they do not use a sufficient amount of electrical equipment and increase the consumption of electricity in rural areas. Greater facilities should be given to farmers to obtain loans for this purpose and I welcome the splendid suggestion made by the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall).

Sir Archer Baldwin: I agree with all that has been said about the importance of electricity in agriculture, and especially on the remote farms. If we are to keep production going in these remote areas electricity must be provided. If my right hon. Friend does not think that the idea of a loan is a good one, I would suggest that the electricity authorities who now give hire-purchase terms for refrigerators should provide those terms for the installation of electricity, which would be very much more useful to smallholdings' and small farms.

Mr. John Hare: As the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said very frankly, a certain amount of ingenuity had to be exercised to get this subject ventilated in the House. We have had very considerable and lengthy debates on it in Committee but regretfully I have not changed my mind and I have not been convinced by the reasons put forward in favour of this proposal. I am sure that that does not come as a surprise to the hon. Member for Sunderland, North in view of our Committee debates. The hon. Member said that loans should be used to supplement grants. There is a major difference between the party opposite and the National Farmers' Union, which wanted loans and not grants.

Mr. Willey: The N.F.U. also argued that if there were husbandry grants, they should be supplemented with farm business loans and that whereas there was an arguable case for grants in the one case, there was an argument consequential upon that, that if one was to provide sufficient assistance by way of farm business aid, it should be in the form of loans.

Mr. Hare: The N.F.U. may have argued that, but, as the hon. Member


knows, its main thesis was that assistance under the scheme should take the form of loans rather than grants. There is thus a major difference between the outlook of the N.F.U. and that of the party opposite.
The hon. Member also said that he felt that advisory officers would be capable of handling the very considerable extra administration which would be needed if they were to be responsible for assessing the credit-worthiness of farmers. The hon. Member for Gloucestershire, West (Mr. Philips Price) was anxious that a system of loans should be introduced to avoid fluctuations in the market. The hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) asked me to take courage to do something which I think would be wrong. My hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall) spoke in the same vein as the hon. Member for Leek, a delightful change for the House to observe.
I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe will excuse me if I do not repeat the very long arguments which I put forward in Committee to show why we think that we were right to stick to our approach of loans, an approach which we put forward on Second Reading and which we expounded in Paragraph 13 of the White Paper. Very briefly, the main reasons are that until a small farmer begins to get the benefit of improvements from the scheme, he will hesitate to come forward and accept the burden of loans being uncertain until he has started to make his improvements whether he will be able to keep to the terms and time of repayment.
Nor do we think that the executive staff of our divisional offices can do what the hon. Member for Sunderland, North thinks they can do. It would be asking far too much of them in a scheme of this great size and which is very different from other services. Thousands of applications would have to be considered and far too great a burden would be placed on people who would not have the specialist knowledge needed.
We think that what we should do is by grants and advice to small farmers to encourage them to build up the productivity of their farms. By doing that, we shall improve the credit-worthiness of the farmers so that those who need further credit will be able to obtain it through normal channels. Those are the argu-

ments which I made in Committee and which are still valid.
Having been able again to air his views on the subject of loans, I think that the hon. Member for Sunderland, North will agree that he would not want me to accept the Amendment, since it would give far too much power to the Minister of Agriculture. So far as I can make out, it is left entirely to the Minister's discretion as to who will get outright grants, who will have to make repayments and over what period repayments will be required and even what, if any, rate of interest should be charged. I do not know what the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) thinks, but I should not be able to take on that invidious responsibility, nor do I believe that any Minister of Agriculture of either party would wish to do so. Having had this further airing of the subject, perhaps the hon. Member will now be kind enough to withdraw the Amendment.

8.15 p.m.

Mr. Willey: That is a leading invitation. We were not necessarily taking the same view as the N.F.U., but were merely calling in aid generally what the N.F.U. had said. We feel that there should be provision for loans. If the Minister had had any doubts about using advisory officers for the administration of such a scheme, he could have accepted the Amendment in principle and found other ways to implement it. However, I agree at once that if a provision of this sort were made, this would not be a very satisfactory way to do it.
I agree that there is a difference of approach between the two sides about credit. We believe, as we said in "Prosper the Plough", that steps should be taken to provide better credit facilities for farmers. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will carefully study that document and seek some other opportunity for meeting what is a major need in farming.
I welcome the intervention of the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall). We think that there is a need for credit facilities, as the hon. Member said. We have taken a further opportunity to air the matter, but, as the right hon. Gentleman has indicated, we do not intend to press the Amendment to a Division. Accordingly, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 4.—(SUPPLEMENTARY PROVISIONS AS TO SCHEMES.)

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. J. B. Godber): I beg to move, in page 4, line 9 to leave out from "for" to "any" and to insert "enabling".
It may be convenient also to take the next Amendment, in line 12, at end insert:
to be modified from time to time on the application of the person for the time being carrying on the business to which the programme relates".
These Amendments are designed to deal with a specific point which the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) raised in Committee, when he asked whether I would make it quite clear that a programme was to be modified only at the request of a farmer himself. That is a valid point and I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for raising it. We have sought entirely to meet the case he put forward and I do not propose to detain the House further.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made:In page 4, line 12, at end insert:
to be modified from time to time on the application of the person for the time being carrying on the business to which the programme relates".

Clause 5.—(REVOCATION OF APPROVAL OF PROGRAMME AND RECOVERY OF GRANT.)

Mr. Godber: I beg to move, in page 4, line 48 to leave out from "on" to "a" and to insert:
for the time being the business to which the programme relates".
This is purely a drafting Amendment designed to clarify the position.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Godber: I beg to move, in page 5, line 3 after "person" to insert:
and, if that person so requests, not more than one other person nominated by him in that behalf".
This is another matter which we discussed in Committee. I then gave an undertaking that if an Amendment which had then been moved were withdrawn, we would seek to meet the point which hon. Members opposite had in mind. We have sought to do so in this way and we have provided for one other person, the choice of the farmer concerned, to go with

him to make representations against a proposed revocation. I hope that that fully meets the wishes of hon. Members opposite. I am grateful to them for drawing my attention to the matter.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Godber: I beg to move, in page 5, line 6 at the end to insert:
a copy of which shall be supplied by the Minister to the first-mentioned person".
This, again, makes a point raised in Committee by hon. Members opposite. In our usual conciliatory mood, we sought to help in every way we could. This closely follows the precedents set out in the Franks Report and we are grateful to hon. Members for bringing it to our attention.

Mr. T. Williams: I do not wish to detain the House for more than a few seconds in order to say, "Thank you" to the Minister and his Parliamentary Secretary for having accepted the wise suggestions submitted by hon. Members on this side in Committee. It is not a very good Bill, but at least the Opposition have made it a little better than it was.

Amendment agreed to.

8.20 p.m.

Mr. John Hare: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
The objects of this short but very important Bill have commanded a wide measure of agreement among hon. Members on both sides of the House. We have had our disagreements but there has been a wide measure of agreement with the principles behind the Bill, and I thank the right hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends for their very helpful and constructive attitude towards the Bill. As the right hon. Gentleman has just said, their efforts have resulted in a number of quite useful improvements.
Before I talk about the Bill in more detail, I hope that I shall not be out of order in saying a personal word about the tragic loss that we sustained, during our discussions, in the death of Sidney Dye. He was regarded with warm affection by hon. Members on both sides of the House and, as in so many of our agricultural debates, he made valuable contributions in our Second Reading debate as well as in our proceedings upstairs. I know that I am speaking for


the whole House when I say that he will be very sadly missed.
First, I want to deal with one or two matters to which I could not give a final answer in Committee and which have not come up by way of Amendments. The first concerns the farm business grant, which is such a very important feature of the small farmer scheme. The right hon. Gentleman and some of his hon. Friends suggested that the instalments of this grant, as we proposed to pay them, after six, twelve, twenty-four and thirty-six months from the beginning of the farm business programme, were staggered too much. They wanted me to pay the whole or a large part of the farm business grant right at the start of the programme.
I think that would be going too far. As a result of the representations put forward by them, however, I have considered the question very carefully and have come to the conclusion that there might be too much of a gap after the payment of the second instalment, as I had originally weighted the scheme. I therefore intend to bring forward both the third and fourth instalments by six months. The four instalments will now be paid after six, twelve, eighteen, and thirty months after the beginning of the programme. I am glad to make this change. I think that it will be welcomed, and it will be helpful. It goes some way to meet the case put forward by hon. Members opposite.

Mr. A. J. Champion: Does this mean that in every case the payments will be made at those intervals? We said that we thought that it would be advisable to speed up payment in certain cases; we did not suggest that it would be necessary in all cases.

Mr. Hare: The payments will be made at those intervals in every case. I can explain why I feel that, having gone this far, I cannot go as far as hon. Members opposite would like. I do not think that it would be right to pay a large proportion of the grant before the farmer has shown by positive action that he has got down to the job of carrying out his programme. It has been argued that many farmers would want to buy extra stock at the start of the programme, but the great majority will probably need to

carry out grassland improvements before they increase the numbers of stock they carry.
There will be some cases where the farmer would be justified in buying stock at the start, but in the last analysis I think that this problem may solve itself. The very fact that a small farmer has had a programme approved under the scheme should improve his credit-worthiness. This, in turn, should enable him to borrow money, in cases where he genuinely needs it right at the beginning of his programme, to supplement the first payment of grant which he will in any case receive six months after he starts work on his programme.
Before leaving the question of working capital I want to make one other point. The field husbandry grants for the improvement and renovation of grassland, and for ditching, are also at standard rates, and they are paid on top of other grants and subsidies. The total grant aid may well exceed the farmer's expenditure where he does the work himself, as he generally will. If he does his own ditching he will therefore have some extra cash in his pocket from that source. In a way, his position will be rather similar to that of a farmer who gets a grant on a standard costs basis for work he doss himself on improvements under the Farm Improvement Scheme. Our experience has been that this standard costs innovation has been widely welcomed and is working very well. The provisions under the small farmers scheme should, I believe, operate to the advantage of the small farmer in very much the same way.
In our proceedings upstairs we were very largely concerned with questions of eligibility. I undertook to satisfy myself that I had correctly stated the effect of the Bill in certain respects, and I have given the matter that consideration. I have already emphasised that the small farmer scheme will be concerned with small farm businesses which are capable of providing an adequate return to a full-time occupier. Our test for this will be that the business is capable of acquiring at least 275 standard man-days after improvement, as is laid down in the White Paper. The actual occupier need not be full-time; he may be working part-time, and be helped by his wife or other workers.
As hon. Members will be aware, provisional applications for both the small farmer scheme and the supplementary scheme were invited last week. Leaflets and application forms have been sent out in large numbers to all those farmers who had already notified the divisional offices of my Ministry of their interest in the schemes. I think that we are off to a pretty good start. The opening day was only 15th January—just six days ago—but from all I hear there has been a very welcome response in the demands for application forms and further explanation.
I have two more things to say. The first concerns the criticism that this scheme is simply a redistribution of income from one section of the farming community to another. That criticism is not justified. Of the £12 million which we estimate the scheme will cost in the first full year, £3 million will be extra money provided by the taxpayer to cover the greater use of the existing ploughing up and fertiliser subsidies which the scheme will encourage.
Another £3 million will be covered by the saving resulting from the ending of the marginal production scheme, and only the rest of the cost—the other £6 million —will go towards the guarantees settled at the coming 1959 Price Review. This £6 million will in general involve, of course, some redistribution from the larger to the smaller farms, but we must keep this in perspective. The amount is very small by comparison with the total of agricultural subsidies, which, we were reminded only a minute or two ago, have been running at between £250 million and £300 million a year.
When I first put forward our proposals, I was called a super-optimist, which phrase was actually used by the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams). He painted a gloomy picture in which the administration of the scheme was going to prove far too heavy a burden for the National Agricultural Advisory Service to bear. Yet, in all these latest stages of the Bill, we find that almost every major alteration which the Opposition have pressed for would have involved extending the scheme and increasing the burden on my Department.
Now, I have been told to offer loans instead of grants. I will not go into

that, because I have already stated the reasons why I cannot accept it. I have been told to extend the scheme to cover holdings at present excluded by the 20-acre lower limit. That again could only increase the burden of administering the scheme. Again, I know that some people feel that I ought to alter the man-days limit at the upper end of the scale to a higher figure.
In all these matters, I must stress the point which I have tried to make right from the start. We are making an honest attempt to tackle a problem which has been with the industry for many years, and to do that we are going to have to resort to methods which are new and untried. This is truly pioneer work, and it would indeed be foolish and arrogant if I were to claim for a moment that we had found the perfect answer at our first attempt. We shall be ready to learn from experience. If we find in a year or two that the limits we have set are too narrow, and that we can and ought to do more, we shall not be afraid to change our plans. Surely, this is not an unreasonable attitude for me to adopt?
I have slightly criticised the party opposite on one or two points, and I am not going to ask forgiveness for that. But this I would say. I do realise that there are honest differences of opinion between both sides of the House about the best way to help the small farmer. We have had our discussion on loans, and we have our differences about how far co-operation should go in order to enable farmers to qualify. These are definite differences of opinion. But I think that whatever our views about the means, we are in fact all agreed about the end.
We all want to put the small farmer in a healthy and competitive position. I am convinced that this Bill, and the schemes which we hope to make under it, offer us the best chance we have ever had so far of achieving just that. If I may sum up in three or four words the purpose of this Bill, I would say that it is to give a new deal, and a better deal than they have ever had before, to many thousands of small farmers.

8.33 p.m.

Mr. F. Willey: May I first be permitted to join the Minister in paying tribute to Sidney Dye? When we had the Second Reading debate on this Bill, Sidney Dye spoke for the first—and as it proved to be


the last—time from this Front Bench. We all recognised him as a very real champion of the small farmer whom we have been discussing in our proceedings on this Bill, and I think we would all remember Sidney Dye as one of the most well loved Members in the House. We all have very great respect for him, and it is hard to believe that we shall not hear him again.
As the Minister has said, we have not opposed this Bill. We have not been as enthusiastic about it as the right hon. Gentleman now seems to appear. I do not know whether that is "Dutch courage," in view of what many farmers are now saying about the Bill. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to forgive me if I did not follow him in all that he said. I realise that he took the opportunity to say several things about the schemes to be introduced so that people can be better informed about them, but I think it is better to await the schemes before we discuss them in detail.
We have not opposed the Bill because we recognise that it will bring some welcome relief to sorely pressed small farmers. It was perhaps designed to mitigate the antipathy of many small farmers towards Tory agricultural policy, although I have never regarded the Bill as a political Measure. It is probably bureaucratic in conception. It is an endeavour to mitigate the harm that is being done to the small farmer by the policy which has been followed by the present Government over the past three years. Therefore, as I say, we are as unenthusiastic about the Bill as members of the National Farmers' Union seem to be at the moment, and as, indeed, some Government back benchers may well be. I have noted that two of the Government's spokesmen on agricultural matters have been silenced; they have been promoted to become Whips.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the rejection of our Amendments. By reason of that rejection we are more than ever convinced that the only purpose of the Government—the only purpose that has so far been revealed—is the scheme dealt with in the Government White Paper. We shall have an opportunity to debate that Order later. Again, like the National Farmers' Union, we regret the failure of the Government to modify their scheme in any way or to anticipate that further measures may be necessary. If

the right hon. Gentleman really believed that the Government intended to do more for the small farmer—if he shared the views of the hon. Member for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin) that much more will have to be done—the Government would have been bound to accept some of our Amendments.
We have an enabling Bill, but we have not been able, as the right hon. Gentleman confessed, to extend the powers which the Government take under the Bill. We have no evidence that the Government will take the measures which are necessary. I am not blaming the Government for creating the small farmer problem, which is an intractable problem that has been with us for a very long time but I feel, as the producers feel, that the Government have aggravated the small farmer problem during the past few years. I do not want to go into any detail but it is shown by farm accounts—in the figures which have recently been published—that the farmer with fifty acres or less has seen his income decline over the past few years and that the small farmer has become relatively worse off during that time. I do not think that is disputed. The right hon. Gentleman was good enough to concede that this was one of his anxieties and one of the purposes of the Bill.
We have to recognise, as the farmers do, that unfortunately this trend is likely to continue. The right hon. Gentleman called in aid the Economistwhen he was telling us of those who sounded the praises of his proposals. If I were in his office I would not be very enthusiastic about support from the Economist.In praising the action taken by the Government the Economistexpressly and specifically said that if the scheme was to benefit the national economy there would have to be further downward revisions at the next and the subsequent price reviews. This is not an encouraging prospect.
It is in that depressing context that we are bound to regard as disappointing the present Measure and the scheme which the Government have announced in the White Paper, for many reasons. I will touch upon only one or two of them. They are disappointing because very many potentially viable small farms will be outside the scheme which the Government are introducing. My right hon. Friend gave the figures when he spoke


on Second Reading. The Government estimate that they will assist and aid 65,000 farmers, 25,000 of them in the first year, but that is only touching the fringe of this problem. I think everyone believes that the Government are optimistic in putting forward those estimates.
In passing, I touch on something which I had hoped the right hon. Gentleman would mention. I again urge the Government to take all the steps they can to increase the Advisory Service. Unfortunately, this is a Cinderella service. I do not think its prospects have been helped by the suggestion made by the hon. Member for Newbury (Sir A. Hurd). I think that has caused some concern, but I hope that the Government will consider the salary and career prospects of the members of the Advisory Service and try to achieve the purpose he has of expanding this Service in view of the calls that are going to be made upon it.
We have to recognise also—as the Government are bound to concede—that the position of many small farmers as a result of this Measure is going to be worsened. Not only will they receive no benefit whatsoever under the scheme, but they will have to contribute towards the expense of that scheme because it is a charge which will be loaded on to the Price Review. To take this action at the present moment is not only inadequate, but—I say this calculatedly—seems likely to drive many of these people to the wall. I cannot avoid a conclusion that this is one of the purposes of the present approach, that not only are those in the most unfortunate position excluded, but upon their shoulders is put the burden of contributing to the scheme itself. If the Government disagree with what I have said, they had better show some real urgency in tackling this problem.
Whether that result obtains or not, the fact remains that the Bill is inadequate and, as I have indicated, only a very partial endeavour to tackle the problem of the small farmer. I would be fair to the Government—this has been referred to already today—they have recognised this. In the White Paper they say they will give further study to the other small farmers, who are particularly adversely affected. If the Government are genuine in this endeavour they had better produce something quickly because this is a part

of the farming community which is most sorely pressed today. It is not easy; it is a difficult problem—a problem which, incidentally, the Economistrecognised— a problem wider than the approach made by the Government in the present Bill. It is at least partly a social problem and certainly something which should be recognised as a national responsibility.
For the Government to take steps which aggravate this problem and at the same time afford no immediate assistance to those very sturdy, independent people working in agriculture, is certainly something which is upsetting the industry. I apologise for going outside the contents of the Bill we are discussing, but I hope the Government will not lose any time in proceeding to endeavour to tackle this further problem affecting not only the farming community but the countryside. Moreover, this is not only a question of the countryside; this is adjusting something which at present is unfair.
The right hon. Gentleman talked about redistribution of income. In fact, surprisingly enough, there is a case to be made out now that there should be a readjustment of income, that if we examine price support the small farmer and the farmer on marginal land gets less than his due from the present arrangements. I would say from the point of view of the countryside and recognising that this is an acute social problem, and from the point of view of adjusting the unfairness of the present arrangements, that the Government ought to tackle the wider problem of the small farmer and the marginal producer.
To return strictly to the Bill and the scheme that we can anticipate from it, I ask the right hon. Gentleman not only to continue his study of the wider problem but to see whether between now and the introduction of the scheme he can make allowance for the criticisms—I believe constructive criticisms—that have been made not only from this side of the House but from outside the House, and get a sounder scheme than the one at present proposed by the Government. If we do not get a sounder scheme we shall get something which will bring some comfort to some small farmers, but I am afraid it will be no more than cold comfort.

8.47 p.m.

Mr. Corfield: I welcome this Bill. I think we all agree that there is a case for weighting agricultural support in favour of those farmers who cannot, owing to the size of their farms, get the same advantages of large-scale production which are available to larger farmers.
However, once we go beyond that, the task of defining what farmers should come into this scheme is almost impossible, and I think that any definition is bound to be arbitrary to some extent and is bound to give rise to a great deal of criticism. I hope that my right hon. Friend will not be unduly deterred by that criticism. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) was very full of it. He talked a lot about unfairness and so on, but he was careful to skate clear of the problem of definition. I believe that that is the crux. It is impossible to define the actual group of farmers whom one should help in a way which avoids drawing entirely arbitrary lines somewhere or other.
The real point to which I wish to draw attention goes to the root of the qualification for assistance under the Bill as it is now drafted. According to the White Paper, the basic qualification is that the farm business should be
capable, with reasonable management, of giving remunerative full-time employment to the average occupier.
Later on in paragraph 7 of the White Paper that is amplified in the following words:
…capable of yielding a net income broadly equivalent to the average earnings of a skilled agricultural worker.
That is basically the same qualification as under the farm improvement scheme of the 1957 Act. They are not the words which are used in the Act, but they are virtually the same words as were used in the White Paper which preceded that Act and to which the Parliamentary Secretary referred in Committee when discussing an Amendment moved by the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Champion). He said:
We intend to be governed very largely by that definition,"—
that is the definition in the White Paper—
but when it comes to writing it into the Bill, there are certain reasons for which we have felt it right not to confine it absolutely

to these words…We felt it right to give ourselves a little latitude in this, while saying that we stand by that definition as an approximation."—[OFFICIAL REPORT,Standing Committee A,2nd May, 1957; c. 226]
I have come across cases in which farmers who have applied for improvement grants under the 1957 Act have been turned down on the very ground that their holdings are not capable of providing this reasonable income for their occupiers. They then find when the White Paper is published, which gives an idea of the scheme that we are going to have under this Bill, that their standard labour requirement is too high for them to qualify, that they have more than 450 man-days. I suggest it is ridiculous to pretend that they are uneconomic. If they are too economic for the purposes of the small farmers scheme, and the basic consideration of qualification is the same in each case, it is quite absurd to say that they are too uneconomic to qualify for an improvement grant.
Of course, it is argued that under the improvement grant scheme of the 1957 Act the definition applies to the land and buildings and that this scheme applies to the business and the men, but I suggest that that is a distinction without a difference. Under the farm improvements scheme we have to look at the land in conjunction with the occupier. The land for the benefit of which the improvement is proposed is to be agricultural land occupied together with buildings, etc., and must be capable of yielding a sufficient livelihood to an occupier reasonably skilled in husbandry. I suggest that once we consider land and buildings of a farming nature in conjunction with the occupier we are considering the farm business in the same way as we are doing under this scheme.
I should have thought that if the standard labour requirement under this scheme of 450 days is a reasonable measure of income corresponding to a good agricultural worker, and if the farmer has shown that his land is capable of carrying that additional labour, he has quite clearly shown that that farm is capable of being economic. It is absurd to draw a fine distinction and say that he is not economic, although he is too economic for the other scheme.
I was rather disturbed earlier on, when dealing with the Amendment relating to small farmers who do not qualify but


wish to co-operate, to hear my right hon. Friend say that he would accept a very loose form of agreement and would not insist on a legal partnership. It seems to me that in any form of joint undertaking in agriculture perhaps more than any other it is essential for the welfare of the people concerned that their rights and obligations should be clearly defined. To encourage small farmers to go into these undertakings without doing so is absolute folly. It is not the two or three guineas which one pays for one's partnership agreement which puts all the money into the lawyers' pockets. It is the hundreds of pounds which accrue when a dispute arises because one has not done that very thing. I beg my right hon. Friend to insist upon a properly drawn agreement.

8.55 p.m.

Mr. Watkins: I agree with the point that the hon. Member for Gloucestershire, South (Mr. Corfield) raised about economic holdings. I hope that he will be able in future to say something about the position in mid-Wales. The hon. Member also suggested that proper agreements should be drawn up. I would not go so far as that because I find that if the farmers whom I represent come to an understanding with one another and shake hands on it they will stand by it.
I was glad that the Minister, in moving the Third Reading, made reference to what I think is an important aspect, namely, the eligibility of part-time farmers for grants under the scheme. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will make the point clear again, although it may only be restating what the Minister has said, namely, that the scheme does not apply only to whole-time farmers.
The Mid-Wales Investigation Report made a tentative suggestion about the compulsory amalgamation of small farms, although it was not accepted by the Government, and expressed favour for voluntary associations of farms. Because of that report the South Wales Electricity Board seems to think that that is the policy of the Government, but I am glad to say that it is not. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will reiterate what has been said. If there is the possibility of the amalgamation of viable holdings, either full-time or part-time, I hope that grants will be given towards them.
On 30th July last year the South Wales Electricity Consultative Council felt that
it would be wrong for the Board to use some of the limited amount of capital available for rural electrification in providing supplies to rural premises which might well be vacated when amalgamations envisaged by the Sub-Commission come about.
The South Wales Electricity Board expressed itself in the same vein. It said, on 12th September, 1958:
…If the amalgamation of farms mentioned in the Report should take place, the number of premises to be connected will presumably be less than at present, and we sincerely hope some clarification will have taken place by the time we come to deal with the Area.
Surely clarification is now required to ascertain whether certain holdings will provide good prospects of agricultural production.
The Board continues:
Otherwise there appears to be a grave danger of effort and capital being applied wastefully to supply premises which will, in due course, be vacated.
I am glad that the Minister does not accept that point of view.
On 22nd December, 1958, the Consultative Council stated that it would not be justified
in recommending that additional capital should be devoted to rural works or that any area such as the Mid-Wales Area should be given special treatment.
The area is composed entirely of farms. I am glad that I have been able to bring that point into the Third Reading of this important Bill. Mid-Wales is not a desolate area, but has in it economic holdings which should be supplied with electricity. The fact is that they do not get electricity and that is why the South Wales Area Board is the worst area board in Britain.
I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will also consider sympathetically any borderline cases. I would ask him to consider mid-Wales more than any other area, but I ask him to give consideration to the borderline cases if he thinks that there is a prospect of the holdings becoming economic. For instance, money can be saved by grants from the Minister of Agriculture, and I suggest that the electricity boards should not be allowed to charge large amounts for bringing electricity to the farms. The electricity boards, in turn, take advantage of the small farmers' scheme or the farm improvements scheme for buildings which pay


33⅓ per cent. or 50 per cent. towards other schemes. There is thus an indirect subsidy from the Ministry of Agriculture to the electricity board, and the board is taking advantage of this. I hope that something will be done about that. I suggest that the Minister should ask his officers, who are in liaison with the electricity board, to watch this.
I hope that the Minister will put into operation what he said when he spoke in Committee about the under-20-acres man and the excess man-days. He said that the Government would consider an alteration of the scheme after some experience, and he said that he was by no means inflexible in his ideas. I wonder how many ideas he has already had. How many ideas has he had from the farmers' organisations about alterations in the requirements for crops and livestock production? How many ideas has he had, and to what extent have his ideas become more flexible than they were during the Committee stage? Will he try the scheme for just one year or two years, and so on?
I was very disappointed to hear what the Minister said this evening about the new schemes not being available for farmers working under 20 acres because of the burden upon the administration. I do not want this to be merely an intention in the future. If people have looked at this aspect of the matter now and reported that the farms under 20 acres should be brought in, I hope that the Minister will not turn that down flatly with the excuse about the burden on administration in future.
How many applications are likely to be received from Wales? The Minister, I think, said that, in the first twelve months, 25,000 schemes are expected under the Bill. In reply to one of my hon. Friends, the Parliamentary Secretary said that there are 28,000 full-time farm businesses in Wales, and one-third of them would qualify. How many of the one-third will qualify for schemes in the first year within the 25,000 for England and Wales? These things are important, because they show whether the Ministry's first impressions are as good as the hon. Gentleman led us to believe that they were. The people with 100 or 150 acres who may come into the scheme are very efficient farmers. The point has been put by hon. Gentlemen opposite as well as by my hon. Friends.
The number actually coming under the scheme may be less than that first indicated by the Parliamentary Secretary.
Finally, I reiterate what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey). I cannot expect any statement from the Parliamentary Secretary now on this, but I hope that there will be no reduction in the guaranteed prices, particularly to those having less than 20 acres or those above the standard man-days in order to provide for the £9 million contribution. I make the plea that they should not have another penalty put upon them, and I hope that their guaranteed prices will not be detrimentally affected.
I respect all that has been said about the Bill, and I hope that it will have a Third Reading.

9.5 p.m.

Sir A. Baldwin: First, I congratulate my right hon. Friend on having introduced the Bill, and I congratulate him also for the way he has stood up to criticism from both sides of the House. No matter how one may criticise, one must recognise that he is the first Minister of Agriculture to tackle this problem. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said that we had aggravated the position of the small farmer during the last three years, but I cannot for a moment accept that. The problem of the small farmer has been with us for many years, and this is the first attempt made to try to remedy the troubles which exist.
I want my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to pass a plea on to my right hon. Friend. Upstairs, the Minister said that he would review the position in two or three years. I suggest that that is much too long a time. As soon as it is ascertained what the response is and what the applications are under the Bill, steps should be taken to see whether another scheme can soon be formulated to meet the needs of those farmers who do not come under the scheme because their farms are either too large or too small.
There is no doubt that a great deal of dissatisfaction exists in rural constituencies because so many small farmers having under 20 acres or other farmers having over 150 acres will suffer as a


result of the marginal production grants being done away with, and they will not come into the small farmers' scheme.
One bright spot I noted this afternoon was the statement that the marginal agricultural production scheme is to be kept on for another twelve months. During that time, the Ministry ought to be able to form some idea about whether the response will be as overwhelming as the Department apparently thought it would be. If the Ministry finds that it will not be overwhelmed with applications under this scheme, it should at once take steps to formulate another one.
I regard it as a great mistake to cut out the small farmers having under 20 acres. For many years, county councils have been creating smallholdings; they have been buying big farms and cutting them up. In my own constituency, there are about 15 county council smallholdings under 20 acres which will not qualify under the Bill. That is something that should be recognised.
I do not agree with the argument that is always put forward that we must not assist a small man either with a farm improvement grant or under the small farmer scheme because he is not a viable unit. I get extremely tired of hearing that. It is time we thought along an altogether different line.
Many of these small men with less than 20 acres are farmworkers who have a bit of ambition and want to become small farmers. They take their 10 or 15 acres of land, continue their work on the farm, get up a bit earlier in the morning to do the work on their smallholding and continue when they get back at night, their wives carrying on during the day. That kind of unit might not be viable, but these are the people whom I would like to see encouraged. Many of today's bigger farmers started as farmworkers. By the steps we take in the Bill, we are removing one or two rungs from the ladder of advance for these people. I am all in favour of the part-time worker being encouraged.
We have had discussion today of the amalgamation of two smallholdings of less than 20 acres to qualify for grant. Knowing as I do the mentality of most small farmers and smallholders, who are extremely independent people, I consider

the prospect of two of them uniting to come in under this scheme to be extremely small. I would sooner see those two small farmers helped independently rather than be expected to amalgamate to come in under the scheme.
This afternoon we heard a great deal from our Scottish friends on both sides of the House about the marginal production scheme. No one from either side of the House pleaded for either England or Wales. England and Wales, particularly the Border counties, are hit just as badly as the Scottish farmers by losing the marginal production scheme. I hope that in the fresh scheme which my right hon. Friend will introduce he will bring forward a scheme to help not only the men with less than 20 acres but also the farmers on marginal land who, possibly, may not be qualified because of the standard man days test but who are having a difficult job to get a living on marginal land. We want to encourage these farmers.
We must go on encouraging full production in agriculture. If there is a reduction in values at the Price Review, and if we do not help those marginal farmers under this scheme, they will drop their production. The country cannot afford to reduce production. Our population is increasing rapidly. Every year we lose something like 35,000 acres of agricultural land, generally the best land. If we do not keep agriculture fully productive, we will find that we are up against a problem of balance of payments much more serious than in the past. I therefore implore my right hon. Friend and the Ministry to ensure that they keep the marginal and small farmers in full production. The need was never more urgent than at present.

9.11 p.m.

Mr. Gooch: I can endorse one of the remarks made by the hon. Member for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin), when he said that the real objective of a Bill of this nature will not be reached because the people mostly in need are left outside. That is true and is a point of view which has been stressed during our debates on the Bill.
The Minister said that he was pleased with the wide measure of agreement with the Bill. Whilst there may be an agreement upon fundamentals, the debates both in Committee and on the


Floor of the House have clearly indicated that there are two divergent views upon the main principles of the Bill. What is more, I should not like the debate tonight to end without calling the attention of the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the fact that there was strong, and certainly influential, criticism of the Bill right up to yesterday.
When a prominent member of the National Farmers' Union says that the Bill stinks, I should have thought that it was the obvious duty of the Minister to reflect and see what was meant. The same speaker at yesterday's annual meeting of the National Farmers' Union said he was surprised that the N.F.U. should have had anything to do with it. That does not speak hopefully of securing the support of the farming community on the Bill. I hoped throughout, especially during the progress of the Bill in Committee, that it would have been withdrawn and something more useful, which would be of tremendous assistance to the small and deserving farmer, would be put in its place.
I am certainly not opposed to putting small farmers in a position to take their place with the larger ones. I am concerned with the wages and working conditions of farmworkers. The object of the Bill, if achieved, would have helped us enormously in securing better wages and working conditions for those who work on the land. That is what I hoped the Bill would do. I want the small as well as the large farmer to be in a position to pay good wages, and to that end I certainly supported the Bill.
I want, however, to make a few general remarks. Certainly, the small farmer scheme will be limited in operation and will, I suggest, cause tremendous dissatisfaction in its working. The basis of such a scheme should be low-interest loans made available to a wider range of applicants. The most objectionable feature of the Bill is that it does not bring new money into the industry but aims at spreading a little bit further the money that is already there.
I was not surprised to learn that the Norfolk branch of the National Farmers' Union passed a resolution only a few days ago placing on record that a large proportion of the small farmers of Norfolk—the county in which I live—will gain no benefit from the schemes but will contribute substantially to their costs. This

is not a case of large farmers actuated by good will contributing finance to help small farmers. Many farmers are prepared at all times to help small farmers in cultivation, and their help is of great value, but when it is a question of handing out money it is another matter.
The Bill really conveys a wrong impression, and I hope that that impression will be removed. It is an impression to the public of Government assistance being given to small farmers, whereas it is not Government assistance, certainly not to the extent of £6 million, to small farmers but a case of the farmers themselves contributing to a general fund out of which some of them hope to get something. There is general alarm and resentment that these schemes should be financed out of the total Price Review award. The question which I have heard asked seriously lately, and to which the Minister and the Joint Parliamentary Secretary should address themselves, is whether this is the thin end of the wedge and whether price support is really in danger. I ask the Minister and the Government to think seriously about this. These two points are certainly being advanced and they call for an answer.
It is too late, of course, now to ask the Minister to withdraw the Bill. It will go forward. I can only hope that some of its objectives will be reached, but I hope also that when a Government of a different colour come into office they will produce something of real and lasting benefit to the small working farmers of the country.

9.18 p.m.

Mr. John Hall: The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey), at the opening of the Third Reading debate, described the problem of the small farmer as intractable, as indeed it is. I doubt whether any Minister of Agriculture, of whatever side, would be able to produce a scheme which would meet the unqualified approval of the farming community, but I think that it is true to say, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin) pointed out, that this is the first time that a really determined effort has been made to tackle this problem. I doubt whether the National Farmers' Union, if asked to do so, unless it were allowed some limited access to Treasury funds, would itself be able to produce a scheme which would be acceptable to the farming community as a whole.
Like many hon. Members on both sides of the House who have talked to farmers in their constituencies, I have heard some praise and, of course, a good deal of criticism. Some of the criticism has not been altogether on the lines that have been mentioned in the debate. I have heard one or two of my more successful small farmers complain to me privately that they could not really see why grants should be given to other small farmers because they were inefficient. They asked why a premium should not be given to them for being efficient and making their farms pay. They did not like the idea of money going to people whom they regarded as somewhat idle and not very capable. But, taking all that into account, one must welcome the Bill as a courageous and even ingenious attempt to solve this difficult problem which has exercised our minds for many years.
All I would do in this short contribution to the debate is to ask the Minister to look at two matters when the time comes to review the scheme for which the Bill provides. I am not at all satisfied that the man-day formula is not being too restrictively calculated. In studying the situation in my own constituency and Buckinghamshire generally, I find that the Ministry calculates that some 40 to 45 per cent. of farms between 20 and 100 acres are likely to qualify. The estimates my farmers make are that the number will be less than that, and my own estimate, having gone round a number of small farms, is that the total number which will qualify will probably not exceed 30 per cent. I should like the Minister to consider the formula and calculation to see whether they should not be adjusted a little when the matter is reconsidered.
There is another problem which is very difficult and to which I see no immediate solution. It is the problem of the farmer who is efficient and who by reason of his efficiency puts himself outside the scheme on the man-day formula. I have a case in my own constituency. A young man who started farming in Buckinghamshire last year on a 50-acre farm, by dint of a considerable period of very hard work and a readiness to accept a very low standard of life and by mortgaging himself up to the hilt and by raising loans wherever he could and by putting every-

thing back into his farm in that year and increasing his stock, in a comparatively short time increased the efficiency of the farm a great deal. Last year, he would have qualified. This year he does not do so. He does not do so because he has been prepared to work much harder and because he has been much more able than others.
It was for that reason that, in Committee, I suggested that the Minister should give himself power to make loans available to meet cases of that kind. If capital could be made available to such a man, who has shown that he is able to increase the productivity of his farm, and if the rates of interest were low, that would be a great boon to him and would help him over the difficult first few years of the development and formation of his farm.
Those are the only two points I wanted to make and I hope that my right hon. Friend will consider them when he reviews the Bill, as he has promised to do, at a later stage. Nevertheless, I welcome the Bill as a determined and useful contribution to the solution of the very difficult problem of the small farm.

9.22 p.m.

Mr. Hayman: The Preamble to the Bill says that it is to
Provide for the making of grants for the purpose of increasing the efficiency of small farm businesses; and for purposes connected with the matters aforesaid.
However, it is not all small farm businesses, but only some of them, and it is because the number is so restricted that we have felt that the Bill is inadequate. It covers farms of between 20 and 100 acres, but of those only 75,000 to 80,000 are likely to benefit, although the Minister put the maximum number at 90,000. There are 136,000 separate holdings of under 20 acres in this country and they represent about 25 per cent. of all our farms.
Few of those can benefit. As the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. John Hall) pointed out, the efficient small farmer is excluded from the benefit of the scheme because of the rule about 450 man-days maximum. Many of the intensively run small-holdings under 20 acres—of which there are many in Cornwall—are cut out of the benefits of the Bill because of this maximum. I agree with the hon. Member


for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin) that the part-time smallholder is often on the first or second rung of the ladder to becoming an efficient farmer on a much bigger farm. Many of the leaders of the Cornwall branch of the N.F.U. have risen from the lower rungs of that ladder in that way.
Under the Bill it would seem that the efficiently run holdings of 20 acres or less, and a great number of part-time holdings, will be excluded from benefit. In spite of what the Minister said, these men will be paying the bulk of the cost of financing the scheme, because about £6 million out of the £9 million is to be taken out of the Price Review.
I would point out to the Parliamentary Secretary that from the figures he kindly gave me recently it is clear that in Cornwall there have been an average of 820 approvals for aid under the marginal production scheme in each of the last five full financial years. There, the scheme is also to be sacrificed, as has been pointed out many times this afternoon, to provide the finance for the carrying out of the Bill.
The Minister made play with the Opposition because they had suggested improvements which would have put more work upon the National Agricultural Advisory Service, but the Parliamentary Secretary gave me an assurance in Committee that, if necessary, that service would be expanded. I hope that there will be no hesitation on the part of the Minister to expand it to meet the needs of the schemes put forward under the Bill and to carry on the normal work of the service. This normal work is too good to be sacrificed even for the benefits of the Bill.
Yesterday, at the Annual Conference of the National Farmers' Union, a resolution proposed by the Cornwall branch was carried unanimously. That resolution deplored the refusal of the Minister of Agriculture to remove the lower acreage limit which excluded many viable farms of under 20 acres. The chairman, Mr. Mutton, said:
The position of the small farmer under 20 acres is almost a tragedy.
That is the verdict of the farmers of Cornwall, and I can say no more than that.

9.27 p.m.

Mr. Harold Davies: We should probably all agree that the House has had some excellent debates during the various stages of the Bill. It is obvious that since the end of the Second World War both parties have had a greater appreciation of the vital importance of agriculture to our economy. I should say that it is probable that more attention has been paid to British agriculture in this Parliament in the last fifteen years than was paid to it in the previous thirty years. That is only a generalisation, which I cannot definitely prove but which I feel.
Without wishing to be too political, I would say that it is no good hon. Members saying that this is the first time that small farmers have been considered. If the part is contained in the whole it can be said that the 1947 Agriculture Act which was brought in by my right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams), was a prop for British agriculture the like of which it had not had before. In that Act the small farmer was given a prosperity and a consideration that he had never had previously. In this Act, however, the man with under 20 acres has been left out.
Why was this Bill produced? We all know, in the House and in the country, that never before has the Conservative Party been criticised, as it has been in the last few years, at National Farmers' Union annual meetings. We are not children. The Bill was produced in a rush, but it is ingenious, although the mathematics of the man-days may yet prove its downfall, because, as has been said, it is possible, under the formula of man-days and the production of grass, for a man to work himself completely out of the scheme. What an absurdity in British agriculture that he can work himself out.
When I begged for loans for the small farmer, both in this House today and during the Committee stage, I was told by the Minister, who was very courteous, smiling and kindly, that it would be putting too much of a burden on the N.A.A.S. But Clause 2 (3) throws an overwhelming burden on the N.A.A.S., because when the farmer receives a grant and wants that grant to be continued, he has to prove that he is doing good farming. It is there in the Clause, and it means that the N.A.A.S., while doing the


book-keeping part of it, must go hopping around the country watching these farms.
I can remember the use of the word "snooping" when the Labour Government were in power. It was called an ugly word when the country was tough and we had just come out of the bitterest war in the history of mankind. It was called "snooping", but this ugly word is forgotten now; the same thing is called intelligent overseeing or justifiable watching over the taxpayers' money. Maybe there is a psychological difference between those high falutin' phrases and "snooping", but there is snooping in this Bill. Not only that, but in this rushed but ingenious Bill there is reference to the Price Review and its position in regard to the general income of the farmers.
I mentioned in this House today and earlier in Committee the fact that right hon. and hon. Gentlemen can speak from now till doomsday, but the fact is that this is in the main a self-financing scheme, and, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley has said, £6 million of it is to be found out of the National Price Review. Well might people say "Is this going to take away the Price Review ultimately?"
We were accused by the Housewives' League and other organisations which went from one end of Britain to the other saying that the British Labour Party wants to nationalise the land. Where is this amalgamation taking us? Now, irrespective of the humanities, the cry is for viability. Viability at a price—never mind the human soul, and never mind Britain's countryside. This is a new cry from the Tories.
I know that it would be completely out of order for me to make a wager with you, Mr. Speaker—but I would bet you a beetroot to a pig's trotter that the party opposite will produce a small farmers' scheme in its manifesto for the next General Election; and I mean for the farmers with under 20 acres.
There are two other points I want to make. The party opposite has divided farmers against themselves. They have got the biggest farmers well away up in the blue skies of prosperity, but the little men, still struggling on the marginal land in my own constituency of Leek, or that of my hon. Friend in Cornwall, or in

Merioneth, or Radnor and counties like that, or in Scotland, are divided against themselves and also against the bigger farmers. They are asking why could not something have been done for themselves and their wives, and we very often forget that it is the wife of the small farmer who gets much of England's fresh food on to the breakfast table.
These small men are now divided. There are 1,710 farms of under 20 acres in North Staffordshire, with 1,340 of them in my constituency, and the men who farm them are not going to get anything out of this. Why could we not have given a little more thought to them? Why could not there be introduced into this Bill, when we were debating an Amendment to Clause 1 this afternoon, provision for them? Why could not the Minister say to my right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley and my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) that he would help them by granting loans for the purpose of taking water and electricity to farms? This would have been a means of real help for the farmer with under 20 acres.
It would be worth while some of the farmers in the House having the courage to attack vigorously the monopolies that are digging themselves into the farming fraternity. I still want to know the facts about fertilisers, about the rubber industry and about the oil industry, which is making huge profits. It is the duty of some party in this country to see that British agriculture is not sacrified to monopolies in that way.
Nevertheless, despite that denunciation, I know that half a loaf is better than no bread. After all, the workers of Britain have never had more than half a loaf from the Tory Party. Therefore, I accept this moderate aid that is to be given to some of the small farmers. The Bill is much better for the constructive criticism of my right hon. and hon. Friends than it would have been had we not discussed it so thoroughly as we have.

9.37 p.m.

Sir Harold Roper: I would make one point very briefly. I fully share the views expressed by many of my hon. Friends on this side of the House, including my hon. Friends the Members for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin) and Wycombe (Mr. John Hall), in giving great


credit to the Government for tackling this very difficult problem.
Disappointment has been expressed on both sides of the House that the benefits of the Bill cannot be extended to all small farmers who, we feel, are deserving of them, particularly those with less than 20 acres and some of those in the hill tracts that are more than 150 acres. I am concerned about the working of the Bill and with the Minister's statement that the cost will be covered in the Price Review and will come out of the global figure.
On the face of it it seems that these farmers, particularly those with under 20 acres, will lose twice over. They will not merely fail to receive the benefits of the scheme, being excluded from it, but they will share in the cost of the benefits given to the other small farmers. We are told that it will involve a very small amount, but a small amount can mean a great deal to a small farmer who is in great need of cash. I hope that in considering the Price Review, in February, the Minister will do his best to see that no injustice is done to those small, deserving farmers who are outside the scope of the Bill, and moreover, that justice will be seen to be done.

9.40 p.m.

Mr. Champion: I do not propose to make a Third Reading speech, but I want to raise one point on this Bill. There seems to be some misunderstanding about the position in England and Wales in relation to what appeared to be a concession announced by the Secretary of State for Scotland this afternoon. That was referred to by the hon. Member for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin), who appeared to be labouring under a misapprehension about the position as it relates to England and Wales.
During the course of that debate, I mentioned to the Joint Parliamentary Secretary that I was hoping for an opportunity to ask this question and to have the answer to it because, having heard what appeared to be a concession to Scotland, it seemed that there was in this Bill another injustice to England and Wales. We must stand up for England and Wales against this Celtic difficult fringe. I am anxious to ensure that if concessions are to be made we in England and Wales are to get our share, or, if not, that there is a reasonable explanation.
Apart from that, the only thing I wish to do is to wish the Minister and the Joint Parliamentary Secretary success in the difficult task which lies ahead of them.

9.41 p.m.

Mr. Godber: May I start by thanking the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Champion) for the brevity of his winding-up speech and for the very kind words at its close. We certainly appreciate those good wishes; indeed, I think we shall need them because we have frankly admitted that this is a difficult scheme to administer, as I think is recognised by hon. Members on both sides of the House.
It is perfectly true that this afternoon my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland did make some concession in regard to the marginal agricultural production scheme in relation to Scotland. That does not apply in relation to England and Wales. They are entirely separate schemes and have never been comparable. The provisions on both sides of the Border are wholly different in this sphere.
I can put it most clearly to the House if I explain that, generally speaking, marginal production schemes in England are of an ad hocnature designed to suit particular problems of particular farmers at particular times, but in Scotland over a period of years there has been a system of annual cropping grants which farmers have come to rely on to a considerable extent. That is an entirely different scheme. There never has been a direct comparison. While I sympathise with the hon. Member in his desire to see that the Scots do not get away with too much in this place, I am afraid that for a long time they have succeeded in doing that, and it is inevitable with their persuasive nature.
I now come to some of the other points which have been raised. A number of hon. Members have sought to make the point that because there are only a limited number of small farmers who will benefit under the scheme, we are being unjust to other small farmers who are outside. I say quite frankly to the House that had we sought to do anything on a larger scale I do not think we could have envisaged bringing in a scheme at all. Successive people at successive stages have looked at the small


farmers' problem, but until now no one has been able to bring forward a scheme.
My right hon. Friend rightly recognised that in bringing forward this scheme he could not go so far as everyone would wish. Nevertheless he thought it right to take a step which would be, of material advantage to many small farmers in helping them to help themselves. This is not a dole but direct help to farmers to help themselves; and it is important to stress that.
My right hon. Friend has also made it quite clear that he has not closed his mind to the possibility of extensions at some later date. I take the point made by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins), who rightly reminded us of what was said in Committee, but I can add nothing further to that at this stage. We must see how it works out. We must take time. My hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Sir A. Baldwin) pleaded that we should not wait the length of time my right hon. Friend has anticipated. I think we must wait and see how it works out, and certainly we must have at least twelve months' actual working of the scheme before we can possibly consider whether we should be justified in making any alterations.
There are those who have said that the means of financing the scheme are such that those who do not qualify— the under 20 acres men, the non-viables —will be unfairly treated as they will be helping to contribute but getting no advantage. We must get this absolutely clear and see the way in which this is being financed. The amount in dispute is £6 million. I will not go over the question of how that is arrived at; we have talked about it many times. That £6 million will rank for consideration at the Price Review. It is nothing more nor less than that. That £6 million can only be said to be found from the pockets of other farmers if the Government of the day decide to make the maximum cut that is possible. Only in those circumstances can it be said that they are in fact contributing directly.
No one can say what the outcome of the Price Review will be. I am certainly not going to announce it at this Box tonight. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I am sorry to disappoint hon. Members. I

realise how disappointed they may be, but until one can see the outcome one cannot say whether other farmers are financing the scheme or not. Even if they are, we must get the matter in perspective. This £6 million is out of a total of £250 million to £300 million in actual grant. To put it another way, it is out of the total value of the guarantees, which was £1,278 million last year, and so the percentage is far less.
As I said on Second Reading, there are those who said that over recent years we have not provided for small farmers. We are seeking to start to provide for them and it is generally accepted that what we are doing is fair and right. I am sorry the hon. Member for Norfolk, North (Mr. Gooch) is not now present, but I must mention him now because he chided me in Committee for not having referred to his Second Reading speech. So, on Third Reading, I must do him justice. He quoted various things which members had said at the annual meeting of the N.F.U. only yesterday. I would remind him that, whatever individual members have said, the N.F.U. set out officially its viewpoint when it made a statement after the announcement of the scheme. It used these words:
Although the Union's representatives have pressed unsuccessfully for substantial changes in the Schemes, they do recognise that they represent a serious attempt to raise the economic and technical standards of a part of the industry experiencing considerable difficulty at the present time".
I think that is an indication of sound statesmanship on the part of the N.F.U. It is willing to work with us in trying to get the best possible out of these schemes. It is important to remember that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Gloucestershire, South (Mr. Corfield) asked me specifically about the comparison with the farm improvement scheme. He felt that there should be unanimity of approach between the small farmer scheme and the farm improvement scheme. I sympathise with his view but I cannot agree with his argument. One must consider these matters separately, because in the farm improvement scheme cases we are considering long-term measures related to the holding and to the land. In the small farmer scheme we are considering purely the farm business as it is managed by the person at present occupying it.
My hon. Friend read from Section 12 of the 1957 Act, but he did not read far enough. He referred to
the land for the benefit of which the improvement is proposed is agricultural land occupied together with buildings and is capable of yielding a sufficient livelihood to an occupier…
He stopped there. It goes on to say:
… reasonably skilled in husbandry…"—
in fact, not to the actual occupier at the time but to a hypothetical occupier. That is written into that Act. But in this small farmer scheme we are considering the actual man and his own productivity. They are two separate things.

Mr. Corfield: Would my hon. Friend not agree that, having achieved more than 450 man-days, a farmer has proved himself reasonably skilled in husbandry? Has he not, therefore, satisfied the test of the 1957 Act?

Mr. Godber: My hon. Friend has not taken my point. The man has proved himself to be reasonably skilled in husbandry but it is not the man himself whom we have to consider in relation to the farm improvement scheme. It is the hypothetical occupier of that farm and not the actual occupier whom we have to consider. There is a distinct difference, and that is the reason why we cannot marry the two absolutely. I can sympathise with my hon. Friend's point of view. It would be so much easier if we could follow that line, but for the reasons given we cannot do so.
The hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor asked me certain questions about numbers of cases involved. The estimated number eligible for the small farmer scheme in relation to Wales as a whole is 9,000. We anticipate that we may get applications in the first twelve months certainly in excess of 3,000. In fact, the hon. Gentleman may be interested to know that already 1,300 or more farmers have asked for application forms. It looks as though the applications are coming in fairly rapidly in Wales—in fact, more quickly than in some other parts of the country.
The hon. Gentleman referred also to borderline cases. It has already been made clear that we will do what we can in borderline cases. We must have some definite limits, but there is flexibility to the extent that a man with under 250 man-days can put forward a scheme, provided he can convince our officials that at the end of the time he will be over 275 man-days. Then he will be able to come into the scheme. That is a substantial concession which should be useful to the smaller people whom he has in mind.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leominster raised the same point which the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East raised, and I have tried to deal with it and clarify the position. Various other questions have been asked but I think that we have had a fairly adequate debate and that what I have said should be sufficient to convince hon. Members that we are trying to provide a workmanlike scheme which can be improved as it goes along. We have made clear our willingness to bring forward new schemes if they are necessary. The legislation as at present framed will enable us to do that.
We are feeling our way in a new field. We are doing something which we believe will be really valuable and practical for the small farmers. This is the third of a series of Measures designed to ensure the continued long-term health of British agriculture and I believe it is so accepted in general by the farming community. We have had criticisms. No doubt, we shall continue to have them in a Measure of this sort, but there is a general measure of good will towards what we are trying to do, and, in spite of the criticisms from hon. Members opposite, I believe there is an element of good will and a desire that this scheme shall prosper. I welcome that, and I welcome the response generally that this Bill has had from the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

TRANSPORT (BORROWING POWERS) [MONEY]

Resolution reported,
That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to increase the limits imposed by paragraph (b)of subsection (1) of section twenty-six of the Transport Act, 1953, and by subsection (4) of section one of the Transport (Railway Finances) Act, 1957, on the borrowing powers of the British Transport Commission, it is expedient to authorise—

(1) any increase in the sums which may be or are to be issued out of the Consolidated Fund, raised by borrowing or paid into the Exchequer under the Transport Act, 1947 (as amended by the Transport Act, 1953), in respect of guarantees by the Treasury of borrowings by the Commission, or under section forty-two of the Finance Act, 1956 (as amended by section thirty-six of the Finance Act, 1958), being an increase attributable to provisions of the said Act of the present Session raising to not more than twelve hundred million pounds the limit imposed by the said paragraph (b);
(2) any increase in the sums which may be or are to be issued, raised or paid as aforesaid under section two of the Transport (Railway Finances) Act, 1957, being an increase attributable to provisions of the said Act of the present Session raising to not more than four hundred million pounds the limit imposed by the said subsection (4).

Resolution agreed to.

TRANSPORT (BORROWING POWERS) BILL

Considered in Committee.

[Sir CHARLES MACANDREW in the Chair]

Clause 1.—(EXTENSION OF ORDINARY BORROWING POWERS OF BRITISH TRANSPORT COMMISSION.)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

9.54 p.m.

The Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation (Mr. Harold Watkinson): I propose that we deal with this Clause formally, because I believe the Opposition wish to debate Clause 2.

Mr. Ernest Davies: That is so. I agree to that course.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 2.—(EXTENSION OF POWERS TO COMMISSION TO BORROW, AND OF MINISTER TO LEND, TO MEET DEFICITS ON REVENUE ACCOUNT OF BRITISH RAILWAYS.)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

Mr. Ernest Davies: As you are aware, Sir Charles, we tabled an Amendment on Clause 2 which, I understand, is out of order because it goes beyond the Money Resolution. It would therefore not be in order to debate the Amendment, but I wish to draw attention to certain aspects of the Clause and matters arising out of it.
The Amendment which we tabled proposed to extend the period during which repayment should take place. As the Clause is now drafted, it is provided that the repayment of any money borrowed to finance deficits shall commence from the seventh year after the deficit has been incurred. When that was agreed upon the prospects for the British Transport Commission were far brighter than they are today, even though we then expressed doubts whether the Commission would be in a position to repay the money seven years after the borrowing took place. However, as I stated, the outlook was then much better than it is today, and in our view it is clear that the Commission will find it extremely difficult to fulfil the estimates in the White Paper, namely, that it can break even by 1962, and we await with great interest the findings of the Minister's Committee which is now reviewing the question of modernisation and seeing what is the earliest possible date when the Commission can break even.
This Clause provides that a further £150 million is to be provided to meet the higher deficits which are being incurred. Incidentally, average interest rates so far have been higher than was estimated when the original Bill was presented to the House. If it was decided that a seven-year period was necessary before repayment should take place when only £250 million was to be borrowed, surely it is obvious that if another £150 million plus interest has to be repaid it would be more helpful to the Commission if that repayment could be made over a longer period.
We therefore regret that no such Amendment to the original Bill was proposed. The position will be impossible


for the Commission. During Second Reading I pointed out that not only would the money borrowed for deficits have to be repaid, but that the interest which accumulated on the borrowings would considerably add to the total amount to be repaid.
I then roughly estimated that, in addition to the £400 million which is to be borrowed by 1962 to meet the deficits, another £100 million would have to be borrowed to meet the accumulating interest. I was challenged by the hon. Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Cole) on that figure. I have since recalculated the figure, and I find that the position is even worse than I expected. As these repayments will commence seven years after the first borrowing, which is 1963, by 1970, when repayments on the borrowings will have to take place, the total interest charges, together with the original £400 million, will amount to about £560 million, which will have to be repaid by the Commission commencing in 1963.
If my figures are correct, it is difficult to believe that it will be possible for the Commission to meet this onerous burden out of future profits. The additional interest which the Commission will have to meet is about £30 million. Does the Minister really believe that from 1963 onwards the Commission will be in a position not only to break even on present reckoning and to meet its central charges —and its total deficit was £85 million last year—but will be able to pay a further £30 million in interest charges from 1963 onwards?
10.0 p.m.
I regret that the outlook is so gloomy and appears almost hopeless, but it is only right that the House should face up to the position and that it should not shut its eyes to the fact that we are postponing the day when the Commission will have to meet its liabilities. We are, I think, rather hypocritical in pretending that we are not subsidising the Commission and calling these loans deficit borrowings. We pretend, as it were, that the Commission will one day be able to repay these amounts instead of accepting that, in the long run, these borrowings are almost certain to turn out to be subsidies. I suggest to the Minister, therefore, that in all honesty he ought to

inform the House whether he is looking into the matter again and reviewing the position. Does he not believe, with us, that long before repayments are made by the Commission his successor will have to come to the House and present another Transport (Borrowing Powers) Bill in order to write off this amount?
We had a wide debate on Second Reading, and I do not wish to repeat matters which were then canvassed. Since then, however, there has been a further deterioration in the position of the Commission as traffics have continued to decline. Certain other events have occurred which have highlighted the Commission's difficulties. As regards the decline in traffics, the full figures for 1958 have now been published. They reflect the fall in production, particularly in coal and steel, which has so seriously affected the freight carryings of British Railways. During the Second Reading debate, of course, we made the case that the Government were responsible for this state of affairs because of their economic policy of stagnation. To debate that now would be to go rather beyond the normal procedure in Committee.
The fact remains that the decline in traffics during 1958 was very serious indeed. Total freight traffics fell from £407½ million in 1957 to £377¼ million in 1958. In other words, the total freight, parcels and mails carried by British Railways brought in revenue £30¼ million less than during the previous year. Coal carryings alone, because of the fall in production and stocking, fell by practically £6 million, and, as regards minerals, there was a fall of £8½ million as a result of the 11 per cent. fall in steel production. These, of course, account for the two largest carryings on British Railways.
The position is very serious, and it is one which it will be extremely difficult for the Commission to overtake. It will be difficult for the Commission to recapture the traffics, and only through a substantial increase in production, which, unfortunately, does not at the moment look probable, can the Commission expect to increase its carryings. With their greater flexibility, the staff of British Railways are showing that they are far more commercially-minded than hitherto, and, in some cases, British Railways are having some success in obtaining traffics which have been carried by other forms of transport. But a great deal of new traffic must


be attracted to the railways in order to overtake the fall which has occurred. Competition is very keen, of course, far too keen in our view. There is an excess of transport facilities and the railways suffer unequal competition from road transport, particularly from the ancillary user, the C licensee.
Bad as is the picture in regard to freights, it is more encouraging in regard to passenger traffics, as the Minister himself pointed out on Second Reading. Yet here again the total figures for 1958 are somewhat disappointing. The total receipts from passenger traffics were just under £20 million. They have fallen, admittedly, by only £137,000 during the year, but they were that amount less in 1958 than they were in 1957. However, in view of the great increase in dieselisation, which has brought in a substantial amount of new traffic, as the Minister pointed out, quoting most interesting figures, during the Second Reading debate, one cannot help being disappointed that the total passenger receipts of the railways were not better during 1958. In other words, if we are, on the one hand, attracting in some directions, there must be traffic which is being lost in others. Why should this be? Why is it that the fall in passenger receipts has taken place and the increase in certain types of traffics has not more than counterbalanced the fall in other directions?
Will the railways be able to recover the traffic? The increase in private transport, private motoring in particular, is bound to affect the railways, but part of the trouble lies in deficiencies in the passenger services of British Railways. It is not the fault of the staff, but there is a fault somewhere which the railways have not been able to overcome in an effort to improve their services sufficiently and provide a reliable service on which passengers can be certain to depend.
For example, the figures for the latest four-weekly period during October, when the weather was not particularly inclement or foggy for that time of year —the worst fogs came in November— show that even in October, although there was a considerable improvement over 1957, only 58 per cent. of the express passenger trains on the Western Region arrived punctually, and that is the region which has the best record of

all. The figure was 55 per cent. on the Scottish Region, 54 per cent. on the North-Eastern, 52 per cent. on the London Midland and 47 per cent. on the Eastern Region.
That is not good enough. If only 47 per cent. on one region can arrive on time, the passengers cannot rely on the services and be certain that they will arrive to keep appointments. The public will not tolerate unpunctuality. Nothing is more infuriating than to be let down by a train. These percentage figures mean that in some cases the delays were considerable whereas in others, of course, they were not of any great account.
The present situation must be remedied if the long-distance passenger traffic is to be held and increased, as it must be, if British Railways are to pay their way. They face competition and must, therefore, be on their toes in this respect. Punctuality must be the first priority. The second, of course, is the provision of adequate facilities, which, unfortunately, are sometimes lacking, particularly in regard to refreshment cars.
I have had correspondence with people who have travelled on expresses from Scotland who, when their train has been three hours late, for example, and they have arrived at about mid-day instead of early in the morning, have found no provision for refreshment. People have arrived at Euston at noon without having had any hot drinks on the train after getting up from their sleepers. That may be exceptional, but it occurs from time to time.
I wonder whether some of the reasons for these failures to provide the adequate services are not the economies which are being instituted and which are endangering the maintenance of an adequate public service by British Railways. On Second Reading, the Minister told us that the Commission had increased the £14 million of economies which it had agreed were possible during 1958 to £20 million and the right hon. Gentleman had ascertained through his auditors that those economies were being effected. He then persuaded —I almost said "forced"—the Commission to increase the economies from £20 million in 1958 to £30 million in 1959.
Does the Minister really think that the Commission can increase these economies, which have been mounting steadily over the years, by a further £10 million


during this year without in any way endangering the public services? Is he confident that the Transport Commission can maintain adequate services on all its undertakings if it is forced to cut down right, left and centre in this way? We see the results of this.
Again, one is bound to ask whether the difficulties which have arisen on London Transport during recent weeks may not be related to the forcing of economies upon the Commission which make it more and more difficult for it to provide adequate services. Last year, the takings even of London Transport, making allowances for the loss that was inevitable as a result of the bus strike, fell by £9 million. Part of that fall and part of the steady drift away from public transport in London, although largely due, no doubt, to the general traffic conditions, is due equally to the insufficient regard which the Commission—or, in this instance, London Transport—can pay at present to the convenience of the passengers. That is to say, it is forced to impose cuts in bus services and on the Underground and to institute other forms of economy which relegate the convenience of passengers below the desire to see that the Commission pays its way. This gives cause for considerable concern.
We all deplore the demonstration sit-down strikes and the direct action which has been taken, because it causes so much inconvenience to other passengers and disrupts the services which follow behind the trains which are held up by these demonstrations. This action is symptomatic of the feeling which exists among many travellers on the Underground that everything is not being done to maintain the services at the high level of efficiency which they have previously come to enjoy and expected to continue.
Heretofore, relations between the drivers, conductors and station staff and the public had always been happy. It is most regrettable that recently, again, I believe, because of forced economies, there has been such a deterioration in these relations that there is almost antagonism between those who use the Underground and those responsible for its operation.
Sit-down strikes are not the answer by any means. The correct procedure is to make complaints to London Transport and, if one is not satisfied, to see whether the consultative machinery cannot be

used. It is not good enough merely to inform passengers why detainments have taken place. It is necessary and highly desirable that passengers should be informed through the loudspeaker system, and I am glad that London Transport is now extending the loudspeaker system to a large number of stations. It is rather tardy in doing this, however, and it should have been done long ago. But what is important is not only to inform the passengers, necessary and desirable as that is, but also to remove the causes of these inconveniences.
10.15 p.m.
The main cause is the fact that trains are stopped short of the destination announced. In many cases that is due not to mechanical faults or even to delays which have taken place, for one reason or another, but due to economies made by uncoupling trains. I gather from correspondence that I have received that that has taken place. There is nothing more annoying than to have a train marked with a certain destination and find oneself turned off it short of that destination, often on to a draughty and cold station.
The statutory duty of London Transport Executive as maintained even under the Transport Act, 1953, is to provide an adequate service. I fear that the economies which are being forced upon London Transport are threatening the maintenance of that adequate service and, therefore, making it increasingly difficult for it to fulfil its duties and responsibilities as it is statutorily required to do. I fear that if adequate steps are not taken to ensure that these services are provided there is a danger of a recurrence of those steps recently taken in the form of direct action through sit-down strikes, which are most unfortunate and inconvenient and are not the right way of going about the matter.
There is an assumption in the White Paper on the Modernisation and Re-Equipment of British Railways, on which the estimates were based, that Government policy regarding the framework within which the Commission operates will remain as at present, that is to say, that there will be no structural changes in the organisation of the Transport Commission. If that were departed from, it might well put the Commission in a very serious position and prevent its paying its way as it estimated in the White Paper it would be able to do.
On Second Reading, I drew attention to the fact that Press reports had appeared of a plan which a committee of Tory back-benchers had drawn up for divesting the Commission of many of its ancillary undertakings. Hon. Members opposite denied that that was the case. I accepted the denial that any plan had been put forward formally by their committee, but the hon. Member for Truro (Mr. G. Wilson) admitted that discussions had taken place.

Mr. John Peyton: The hon. Member attempted to run this hare on Second Reading. I am bound to say, with great deference to you, Sir Charles, that I fail to see how he is in any way justified in bringing this up on the narrow Clause which he is now discussing. I say to the hon. Member now that he is shedding the worst possible light upon his very poor case by bringing up a point of this kind. If, every time a Sunday newspaper cares to air its views and attribute them to a Member of the House, and that attribution is promptly denied, the hon. Member tries to make as much of it as he is doing on this occasion, he reveals, as he persistently does, the absolute poverty of every case that he advances.

Mr. Davies: I thank the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) for his intervention, because I am about to quote something which makes my case far stronger.
However, I want, first, to explain my reason for raising this point. It is that I am convinced that if the suggestions which have been made by hon. Members opposite were carried through, it would be quite impossible for the Commission to repay its borrowings in the way provided in the Clause, and it would make the sum which we are now voting inadequate to meet the deficits which would be incurred up to 1962. For that reason I consider that the matter is in order, but that is something for the Chair and not for the hon. Member to decide.
What I wanted to say was that hon. Members opposite issued a denial of the Sunday Expressstory. During the Recess, as late as 2nd January, there appeared a story in Motor Transportfrom that magazine's political correspondent, presumably one of the journalists in the Press Gallery. The story was headed:
Tory minority's startling plan.
Full denationalisation and abolition of licensing.
From our Political Correspondent.

The story read:
A number of Conservative M.P.S who have been examining road transport policy have come to a number of conclusions which, I understand, one of them has sent to the Minister of Transport.
It proceeds to recapitulate what was said in previous reports and goes on:
The B.T.C. would have to shed many of its ancillary services such as hotels and refreshment services, and either lease or sell outright its shipping and inland waterway services. In this picture the solution is seen to be complete denationalisation of road transport, including road passenger services.
That appeared on 2nd January, after the denial of hon. Members opposite, and I therefore feel fully justified in referring to it. I have seen no denial in Motor Transportof that report, nor have I heard any denial.

The Chairman: I think that the hon. Member is getting away from the Clause.

Mr. Davies: As I said, Sir Charles, if this plan were carried through, it would deprive the Transport Commission of those sections of its undertaking which are earning substantial profits and the sum which we are voting would then be made quite inadequate. I would then have to argue that the amount should be substantially increased. However, I have made my point, except to ask the Minister to give the Committee an assurance that he will not give support to any plan which will deprive the Commission—

Mr. Peyton: On a point of order. I hope that you will agree, Sir Charles, that there has been no intervention from this side of the Committee which was out of order, and yet the hon. Member continues to refer to such a plan which is distinguished only by one fact, that it does not exist even in the minds of Members of the Tory Transport Committee, which is nothing to do with the Bill. My hon. Friend is not here to defend such a plan, because it does not exist. The hon. Member is making constant reference to a nonexistent plan and is thus more than usually out of order and grossly irrelevant.

The Chairman: I did suggest to the hon. Member that he had gone a little too far and I thought that he was getting into order and then encouraging the Minister to go out of order when his turn came, which was rather bad of him.

Mr. D. Jones: On a point of order. In its proposals for railways, the British Transport Commission made it crystal clear that there were five assumptions which had to be made if the plan for modernisation was to succeed. The fourth was that Government policy regarding the framework within which the Commission operates would remain as at present. If, therefore, there is a suggestion that the framework within which the Commission is to operate and break even by 1962 is to be altered the Minister should tell us about it.

Mr. Watkinson: At this late hour I can save a lot of excitement if I ask the hon. Member to read the answer which I gave to his Question today, which was not reached orally. It will save him much needless anxiety.

Mr. G. Lindgren: Will the Minister equally stop the inferences made by hon. Members opposite which tend to cause the Press to take the line that it is now taking? There is no smoke without fire, and the Press obtains its views from conversations with hon. Members opposite.

Mr. Davies: Irrespective of whether or not there is a plan, I hope that the Minister can give a categorical denial of any intention to interfere with the framework in any way which would contravene the assumption made in the White Paper to which my hon. Friend has just referred.
The denationalisation of road haulage deprived the Commission of a considerable amount of money annually, and its profits fell from £9 million to £2 million.

If its ancillary undertakings are disposed of, not only will it harm the Commission but it will take away its profits.
In conclusion, I regret that it is necessary to be rather pessimistic about future prospects. Unfortunately, nothing has occurred since the Second Reading debate to improve that outlook. I am satisfied that the Commission is doing all it can to improve its position and to reach the target which it has been set of breaking even by 1962. We admire it for the steps that it has taken. Certainly deficit financing is the only way of tiding it over, combined with the much more important modernisation which is taking place.
I am fearful that the sums being passed in Committee, and on Third Reading tonight will prove inadequate to meet the deficits which are likely to be incurred by 1962. I hope that I am wrong in this, but I fear that time will show that we are agreeing not to finance deficits out of loans but to make what will turn out to be subsidies to the Commission. I am convinced about this by the very heavy interest charges which increase this sum so substantially.
The Commission is being asked to carry an intolerable burden. Although the Bill is necessary—and we shall not oppose its Third Reading—for the reason that I have given I fear that it will not be many years before it becomes necessary for whoever occupies the Minister's post to ask for further sums, not to be voted in this way but to be either written off capital or granted in the form of a subsidy.

10.30 p.m.

Mr. Lindgren: At this late hour I do not intend to emphasise unduly the excellent points which have been made by my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies), but it is essential to reinforce them from the point of view of the hundreds and thousands of men and women who spend their working lives in the industry covered by the borrowing powers which we are discussing. I reinforce them, too, from the point of view that the capital structure of the Transport Commission is unreal.
I grant to hon. Members opposite that they may say that that structure was created, reinforced— or whatever word they like to use—by the Transport Acts of 1947. That is true, but a great deal has happened since 1947, and for purely political, doctrinaire reasons right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite have disturbed the structure of transport operation, so that both the capital construction of the Transport Commission and its operational function are now in an entirely different position from that envisaged under the 1947 Act. It was a structure created by the 1947 Act.
The Commission— or any nationalised industry— has a business requirement totally different from that of any other industry. The charge for interest on its capital is a charge to the industry to be borne before the profit and loss is determined. If the requirements of revenue and operational costs were met, and only then had it to be decided whether there was a profit or not, the position might be a little different, but under the present structure the requirement to meet the interest on the capital of the industry comes before the determination whether there is a profit or a loss. I therefore join my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East in saying that it is impossible for the Commission to break even by the dates mentioned.

Mr. Leslie Thomas: Would the hon. Gentleman clarify the point he is making? How have we altered the capital structure of the Commission since we have been in office?

Mr. Lindgren: Not at all. If I did not make myself clear, I am sorry. I was trying to make the point that the

capital structure is the same as under the 1947 Act—hon. Gentlemen may have that point—but that what has happened since 1947 is that the functional structure of the Commission has been changed and, also, the co-ordination of the various elements of transport.
It was envisaged that by that co-ordination of road and rail transport the Commission would break even, because of the integration of the various systems of transport. But what has happened? There has been denationalisation of certain of the profitable parts of the transport services; there has been hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of wasteful expenditure on decentralisation; there has been decentralisation of traffic arrangements; the setting up of fresh offices; dispersal of staff from some places and concentration of staff in others. All this has been done because of the purely political, doctrinaire methods determined by the Minister, not by the Commission. Do not forget that the area board traffic arrangements now being established were not the brain-child of the Commission. They were conceived inside the Ministry. The present decentralisation, the empire building, the area boards which were set up, were determined by the Ministry.
Rt. hon. and hon. Members opposite have to determine whether transport is a service or an industry. On the basis of being a service, it can never break even. On the basis of being an industrial undertaking required to show a profit, as I said on Second Reading, only if it undertakes the more profitable sections of transport, road and rail, can it break even if required. My hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East referred to the recent problems of London Transport. He was correct in saying that a considerable number of them arose from economies which were insisted on by the management of London Transport in an attempt to break even on its revenue accounts.
I shall give a recent instance of the question of transport being a service or an industry. I can give the Minister details of a case concerning road transport, although I do not think it would be fair to mention the organisation concerned by name. It was operating around Lancashire with lorries carrying


40 tons of traffic and got into difficulties in the fog, ice and snow. This road haulier organisation is a very reputable one and operates under the best conditions. The drivers of the three lorries in convoy, finding themselves in difficulties, asked their headquarters in the north-eastern part of England what they should do. They were instructed to call at the nearest railway station which had a goods yard.
That was in Staffordshire and the load was transferred from road to rail. There was the fullest co-operation between the road haulier and the Transport Commission in getting the 40 tons of traffic transferred. I quote that only as an example of an alternative means of transport which was used under very serious conditions which neither the road haulier nor the Commission could control, but it was a service which could operate under those conditions.
There must be a number of hon. Members in the House who, during the last two or three weeks, have undertaken journeys by rail which otherwise they would have made by road. Conditions made it preferable for them to go by rail in the ice, snow or fog. If we are to have these facilities available we have to determine whether or not we are to meet the capital cost of the facilities on the basis of showing a profit year by year or by recognising that transport is a service.
We have to accept the fact, referred to by my hon. Friend, that unless there is capital reconstruction of the Transport Commission it cannot break even. We have to be honest with the public and say that we have to meet it by some form of subsidy, deficiency payment, or some other way. To go on piling up deficits year after year, and charging interest on the deficit which has been created and paid out of capital, is fantastic to the "ninth" degree and is misleading the public. We ought to be honest both with the public who are users of transport and with the workers in the industry.
I am delighted to hear statements by hon. Members opposite—

Mr. Peyton: Reverting to the Second Reading debate, the story put about by the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) was denied then as it had

been previously denied. The difficulty that hon. Members opposite so persistently and continuously face is that they are unable to accept these words in the meaning that they are clearly intended to bear. The poverty of their case is shown by the fact that they have done everything possible to find something that will bolster up their case.

Mr. Lindgren: I hope the hon. Gentleman will not get too cross. I am speaking on behalf of men and women who are spending their working lives in the industry. It is disturbing to those persons, whether they are in the hotels or in whatever section of the industry they may be, to be unable to get any confirmation of these statements. The hon. Gentleman denied the first statement that was made in the Sunday Express,but these statements are persisted in by very reputable journals.

Mr. Peyton: By whom?

Mr. Lindgren: By journalists who get their information from some source or other.
Hon. Members opposite may say that railway workers, road transport workers, those engaged in refreshment rooms and hotels and in ancillary undertakings of the Transport Commission are suspicious. But they have seen every profitable section of the transport industry being hived off. The only reason why hon. Gentlemen opposite hived off sections of road transport was that road transport was more profitable than rail transport. It was an opportunity to make a profit.
They have seen the handicap put on London Transport in operating their coach services in off-peak times to get revenue from private coach parties. They have been prevented from operating by the 1953 Act. That tends to cause those workers to be even more suspicious than they otherwise would be when they see in the Press statements alleged to have been made by hon. Members opposite.

Mr. R. Gresham Cooke: It is generally known that the hon. Member for Enfield,East(Mr. Ernest Davies) and other hon. Members opposite are closely associated with Motor Transport,and that the hon. Gentleman is a contributor to it. We ought to have a categorical assurance that hon. Members


opposite have not been gossiping with the correspondents and putting these stories about.

Mr. Ernest Davies: Occasionally, I have a signed article in Motor Transport,but I am not its political correspondent and I am not in the confidence of the Tory Transport Committee. This purports to come from the Tory Transport Committee. I can assure the hon. Member that I am absolutely innocent of this story, which I certainly would not propagate.

Mr. Peyton: On a point of order, Sir Gordon. I have raised this point before, but is not this subject enlarging the whole scope of this debate beyond the Clause under discussion? Is it not grossly improper that hon. Members opposite should rake up this old stuff to make a party point which is not relevant to the issue under discussion?

The Deputy-Chairman (Sir Gordon Touche): I think that the debate has gone a little wide. What journalists say cannot be relevant to this debate.

Mr. Lindgren: If I was the cause of this digression I am very sorry.
But I would say that one of the biggest factors in the effective operation of transport is the worker who carries out the operation. Whether he is the engine driver, the guard, the porter, the ticket collector, the dining car attendant, a receptionist in a hotel, or whether he is employed in some other section of the industry, it is very disturbing when it is continually said in the Press, whether rightly or wrongly, that this or the other section of transport is to be hived off.
I see that the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance has now arrived. Transport workers remember that he referred to those who accepted responsibility as chairmen of the British Transport Commission as "Quislings." If Tory Ministers refer to the chairmen of the Commission as "Quislings," are we really unduly suspicious in taking very seriously attempts by Tory back benchers to undermine the structure of a nationalised industry?

10.45 p.m.

Mr. Peyton: On a point of order, Sir Gordon. I do not wish to raise frequent points of order, but this is the same one. Are we really discussing allegations about

"Quislings" now, or are we discussing a rather narrow Clause in a financial Measure? With very great respect, I ask that the hon. Gentleman the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Lindgren) should have this licence curtailed.

Mr. D. Jones: Further to that point of order. We are discussing deficit financing in the Transport Commission. In 1957, the deficit on the railways amounted to over £57 million, but on the ancillary undertakings there was a surplus of about £3 million, which reduced the deficit to be met from this borrowing by that amount. Surely we should be able to argue that those ancillary services ought to remain with the Commission. If they are hived off, obviously the deficit on the Commission's railway services must increase substantially, and the figures which are put in the Bill about money and time will obviously not be sufficient to meet it.

The Deputy-Chairman: Yes, of course, we can discuss anything about finance. It is not a very narrow Clause; it is a wide Clause. But we cannot really discuss rumours.

Mr. Lindgren: All my digressions have not been of my own making, though I admit that I trail my coat, too.
The point I really want to make is this. The worker in the industry makes a very valuable contribution towards the possible profitability of the industry. Continual suggestions or inferences that sections of the undertaking—the most profitable sections of it, as my hon. Friend the Member for The Hartlepools (Mr. D. Jones) very effectively pointed out in his intervention—are likely to be affected undermine morale among the workers. No one likes to be associated with an industry which is constantly being condemned and blamed for not being profitable. Therefore, the sooner we put the financial structure of the industry on a correct basis, upon which those providing the service can charge a reasonable rate to meet the costs of the service, giving them the opportunity to secure the traffics they need to obtain the revenue, the sooner shall we be likely to reach the chance of breaking even.

Mr. L. Thomas: Is the hon. Gentleman now saying that the Transport Commission should raise charges, either passenger fares or freight rates, so that they


should be profitable? His hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) was advocating a subsidy.

Mr. Lindgren: The fact is that the present capital structure of the Commission, which has to provide an alternative service for both passenger and freight traffic, having to maintain the permanent ways, the signal boxes, the stations, the yards, and all the rest, and provide a staff, means that it is impossible for the Commission to break even. If it is to be an alternative service to be available as required for both passenger and freight traffics, that must be so.
There are only two alternatives. Either charges must be increased to those who use the service to the extent that its cost will be covered, or we must accept that this high capital provision, which is over and above that which is necessary to meet the existing traffic, must be met by other means. We may call that a deficiency payment, a subsidy, or whatever we like. On the basis of the present structure and of possible traffics, however, it is impossible for the service to break even and render a reasonable service to the public and be available to provide an alternative service to be called upon as and when required both for passengers and for freight.

Major Sir Frank Markham: I object, naturally, to the way in which the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Lindgren) has trailed his coat so much in front of us all. I do not want to tread upon the tails of that coat and widen the argument or increase any bitterness, but the hon. Member has left out of his calculations for bringing the railways on to an even keel one important suggestion which, I know, has bean considered both by the Transport Commission and by my right hon. Friend the Minister.
That suggestion is that it is not only a question of whether there shall be a subsidy or higher fares and freights. There is also the establishment of fair, competitive terms for the railways as compared with road services. In the case of the roads, the State takes over the charge for the permanent way, the signalling and the policing.

Mr. Lindgren: And for breakdowns.

Sir F. Markham: And for breakdowns, in some cases.
I have suggested many times that the State should make the permanent way, the signalling and the policing a State charge. If that were done, the railways, in competition with the roads, would stand a fair chance of breaking even. There would once again be that pride in the railways of paying their own way. I hope that both my right hon. Friend and the Commission will come back again to reconsider giving the railways a fair chance in straight-forward conditions with the roads.

Mr. Lindgren: In May, in the last negotiations on wages, the Minister and the Prime Minister promised that they would examine the question of relieving railways of charges which are unfair but which have to be carried, such as roads over bridges, level crossings and the rest, but they have done nothing.

Mr. Ernest Popplewell: I feel that this debate is taking place in an entirely unnatural atmosphere. We will solemnly pass this Bill authorising the Commission to borrow this extra money. At the same time, there are the previous provisions that the cash must be repaid by a certain date, together with the necessary safeguards. Everyone knows that that is fantastic.
Under the present financial structure, it is completely impossible for the Commission to be anywhere near breaking even by 1962 and then, on top of that, to face interest and central charges which, by that time, will be not in the region of £60 million, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) said, in the region of £90 million to £100 million. That is fantastic. Everyone knows that the Commission will never be able to do it.
We can talk about whether there should be a subsidy or anything else, or whether there should be a reconstruction of the financial arrangements of the Commission. That will have to be undertaken by whoever is in power, and I venture to suggest that it will be our job when we occupy the benches opposite after the next General Election. Therefore, I feel that this is an entirely unnatural debate. We are solemnly to attempt to do all kinds of things, and although I


do not want to make a long speech, I do want to refer to certain matters which, in my view, need explaining.
The Clause with which we are now concerned—indeed, the whole Bill—is for the purpose of meeting deficiencies on the revenue account of British Railways. During the Second Reading debate, I asked a number of questions which, in my opinion, were concerned with this matter of increasing the expenditure of the Commission, forcing it still further into the "red. "The Minister referred certain of my questions to the Parliamentary Secretary for reply. I asked, for example, about the new programme for concentrating on the London —Manchester electrification works at the expense of other works.
There was no reply to that, and I sincerely hope that the opportunity will be taken tonight to give me a reply. I hope it will, because if work is to be concentrated on the London—Manchester electrification scheme it must be at the expense of other work; and that will mean a further loss of revenue. Other sections which should be modernised will not be attended to so quickly, and the result will be an increase once more in the Commission's deficiency.
We are entitled to know what work is likely to be retarded by this fit of the Minister to concentrate on one aspect of the programme. It is so typical of the Minister; so typical of the administration of this Government.

Mr. Watkinson: I do not dictate the priorities in the modernisation scheme. That is a matter for the Commission to decide.

Mr. Popplewell: Oh, yes, we have heard that so often; but the directives come from the right hon. Gentleman's side of the House. The Commission has to carry out a policy, and that policy is given by the Minister. The Commission has to try to arrange its programme within that policy.
From time to time we have seen this Government going by fits and starts in the matter of transport policy. First, there was a lot of ballyhoo about a modernisation programme costing £1,200 million. In 1957 the brake was applied, and the Commission was put into difficulties. There have been additional costs imposed on the Commission because work which has been commenced has been retarded.

Then, after work has been retarded, the Minister has come along and said,"Go ahead".
The result is that the Commission has incurred an extra cost of £300 million. That is the effect of what has taken place; and yet again the Minister says that certain work will be given priority while other work is retarded. This policy of fits and starts gives the Commission no chance at all. Work commences, and then the brake is put on with the result, as every practical man knows, of increased costs.
11.0 p.m.
Moreover, instead of the Commission getting its undertaking modernised and getting increased revenue by the dates suggested, this leads to a further slackening in that direction. I hope, therefore, that the Minister will tell us what work will be retarded consequent upon concentration on the extension of electrification on the London—Manchester line. It is no use the Minister evading his responsibility and trying to push it on to someone who cannot answer.
The Minister is responsible to the House for the Commission's operations. The Chairman of the Commission cannot come to the House and shelter behind the Minister. This is a question of policy and the 1947 Act lays down that the Minister is responsible for policy and for the directives. Let him, therefore, not try, as he has attempted so often, to shield himself behind the Commission. I asked for the actual cost of operation of the area boards. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary replied that it was about £20,400. That might be the cost of salaries, but everyone knows that that was not the correct answer. I asked not only about salaries but about the expenses involved. I would press for a further reply to that point.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation (Mr. G. R. H. Nugent): May I help the hon. Member? I am not sure whether he was in the House at the time. The reply I gave was that the expenses are negligible. I believed that I would be able to get actual chapter and verse for them, but I am assured by the Commission that they are, in fact, negligible. I said that in col. 627 of the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Popplewell: Yes, I have that already marked on my copy of HANSARD, but I do not accept the hon. Gentleman's riding off and saying that the cost is negligible. He mentioned a figure of about £20,400, but the other expenses he rides off and says they are negligible. I do not accept that. I have some knowledge of what is taking place in the areas. One wants to know not only about salaries but about other expenses involved in the operations of the area boards.
How often do the boards meet? It is probably once a month, but we do not know. How often does the chairman meet the board? How often does he matter at, or nag, as it has been put, the respective officers of the various areas? How much time is involved in preparing schemes to meet the wishes of chairmen? What expenses are incurred on motor cars? What types of cars are used? Are these cars used only by chairmen of area boards, or are they used by other people? We are entitled to know these things.
I also asked further in that debate questions about the administrative build-up, the empire building that is taking place, and the many appointments made at salaries outside the rates advertised, and above those paid to the special classes. We know from practical experience that this build-up is not in the best interest of efficient administration of the organisation.
I requested some information in this connection. We are entitled to have it, because all these matters have an important bearing on the Commission's costs. They have also an important bearing on how quickly we can get back to a better state of efficiency within the industry itself. It is not my intention to make a long speech on these points tonight, but I hope that we shall get somewhere and that we shall have some information from the Minister without his trying to shed his responsibility and shelving it on to the Commission. It is the Minister who is responsible to the House of Commons. The money which we are authorising is a fantastic sum. It is entirely his responsibility that this Alice-in-Wonderland finance should have been forced on the Commission. Every practical man knows that there is no possibility of this money being repaid.
Instead of bringing in another Bill of this description, the best thing that the Minister can do is to introduce a Measure which will entirely reorganise the Commission's financial arrangements. The right hon. Gentleman knows that this is a stop-gap and that he will not have to answer when the time comes, because it will be our responsibility, when we are sitting on those benches, to clear up the terrific mess into which the Government have plunged the Commission.

Mr. L. Thomas: I do not propose to detain the Committee at this late hour, but in view of what has been said by the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Da vies) and by the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Lindgren) about the intentions of certain hon. Members on this side of the Committee who are associated with my party's Transport Committee, I must take this first opportunity to deny what was said about a scheme with which my name was associated.
It was a figment of somebody's imagination. To denationalise the railway industry at this time would seriously undermine the country's economy and have serious consequences for the country's communications system. I am sure that that is the view of my hon. Friends whose names were associated with the article. I hope that from now on the suggestions and implications which have been made will cease.
There is no doubt that the British Transport Commission is now bankrupt. It is only the Bill which has saved it. The hon. Member for Enfield, East drew a somewhat gloomy picture of future finances, but I think that he was right to do so. As far as one can gather from the accounts, at present the Commission has a capital structure of about £1,600 million. By the time the modernisation plan has been completed, over fifteen years, the capital structure will be about £3.100 million, or more.
I do not know what the rate of interest on the new capital will be—perhaps the Minister can tell us—and it will obviously vary with day-to-day rates. However, in view of the Commission's present difficulties in meeting its central charges, how much greater will those difficulties be in a few years, with an interest rate considerably higher than the present 3 per cent. which now applies to the bulk


of its borrowings—Transport Stock 1978–88—and when rates may be as high as 5 or 5½ per cent.?
I want the Minister to clarify a financial point which I do not understand. The latest date for the redemption of the existing Transport Stock is 1988. At some time or other the new capital investment will have to be funded and put on the market. I think I am correct in saying that under the 1947 Act the redemption charge on the Commission is over ninety years. There is, therefore, a gap between 1988 and 2036.

Mr. Lindgren: The hon. Member will not be here then.

Mr. Thomas: I will not be here, but my children might be. Who bears that redemption charge in the meantime? I am not clear; perhaps my right hon. Friend can help me.
The hon. Member for Enfield, East emphasised the point about deficiency, payments. He said that if the other assets of the Commission did not show a profit this deficit would be even larger. I would recall to his mind the exchange of letters between Sir Brian Robertson and my right hon. Friend, published in the recent White Paper, in which Sir Brian said that the revenue from the other assets would just about be in balance. But what happens if the other assets are not in balance, but show a deficit? Is there to be a further demand upon the Exchequer?
It is all very well for hon. Members opposite to talk about not hiving off this, that and the other, but should the taxpayer be called upon to meet the deficit that accrues in the running of a luxury hotel like Moretonhampstead, Tregenna, or Gleneagles? That is the sort of consideration which must be taken into account.

Mr. Charles A. Howell: Can the hon. Member name one hotel that is running at a loss, which the taxpayer will have to pay for?

Mr. Thomas: The hon. Member has missed my point. A considerable number of hotels have been disposed of, and that is a very good thing. I hope that there will be more. I believe that my right hon. Friend has quoted a figure of 17. These hotels have ceased to be an ancillary to the railway. They were built because of the long-distance traffic that

they would naturally engender, but 99 per cent. of the people going to these hotels today travel by road. It is that sort of thing that we have to watch.
The hon. Member for Wellingborough talked about the existing capital structure, but he did not suggest any new form of capital structure which should be created. The compensation stock which starts with a fixed, flat ceiling, is quite out of relation to the trading aspects of the whole concern. This great transport industry has trading risks exactly as other trading companies have, and its capital should, therefore, be related to the risks involved. I hope that when the final capital structure of the Commission is evolved there will be a scheme by which the Government can bear some of the risk capital, because I cannot see how this industry, as it is at present, can face the enormous strict capital charge which it will have to meet from approximately 1972 onwards.
11.15 p.m.
My only other point was mentioned by the hon. Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, West (Mr. Popplewell) and the hon. Member for Wellingborough, in connection with the existing organisation. I do not believe any railwayman today who has any sense of responsibility of management would like to go back to the old functional organisation of the executive, because if there was one organisation which undermined the morale of the railwayman because it failed to give him the responsibility and authority to which he is entitled, it was that organisation.
I believe that one of the problems in the profitability of this industry is the fact that still today there is not sufficient delegation of authority right down to the lowest possible level.

Mr. Lindgren: Perhaps the hon. Member will take an opportunity, which no doubt the Minister will arrange for him, to visit one of the new line traffic offices which are being built, the staff being shifted here, there and everywhere, and see for himself, if he will not take it from me that this is so, that whole lines are being disorganised to build up this new organisation. The people there will tell him that this is a complete waste of money and thoroughly ineffective. Let the hon. Member ask the staff.

Mr. Thomas: It is nearly thirty years since I left the railways. When one joined that great service—and although it is thirty years since I left there is always a niche in one's heart for one's first love —one always understood that one was joining a service in which one was liable to be moved here and there. I do not think there is any more shifting around than there was in those days. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh, yes there is."] Labour has to be mobile in this economy in particular.
Lastly, I come to the matter of the commercial approach. It affects profitability. We have been told time and time again that when the passenger services have been modernised, either by dieselisation or complete electrification, the results have been extraordinarily good, and that lines which in the past have shown a loss, or only just saved a loss, are now showing a profit.

Mr. Lindgren: Operationally.

Mr. Thomas: That is fine.
What is happening today? Particularly on those lines which are being modernised, where as a first experience of modernisation we should expect a degree of profit, the Commission is making application to put up its charges.

Mr. Popplewell: Oh, really.

Mr. Thomas: Yes.

Mr. Popplewell: Where?

Mr. Thomas: It is a frightening thought. I would ask the hon. Member to come on my line. It is a frightening thought that there are season ticket holders who are not yet today getting their money's worth. The hon. Member for Enfield, East emphasised the delays. I can assure the hon. Member that one cannot make an appointment in London within half an hour of the scheduled time of any of the trains from the North Kent coast. Any member of the travelling public on those trains can say that is true, and the general manager will admit it. At the time that electrification of that section is due to be completed—it is to be in operation by June—and we are entitled to expect increased profitability, the Commission ask for the right to increase fares. That is not the correct commercial approach which should be made by this great industry.

Mr. Popplewell: I do not think the hon. Member has amplified the argument he was trying to make. He says that with modernisation and dieselisation and increased traffic the Commission is still having to apply to put up charges. Would he not be a little more honest and say the reasons why the Commission is having to put up charges are such reasons as these, that there has been a 550 per cent. increase in sleeper charges, a 245 per cent. increase in the cost of copper tubes, a 470 per cent. increase in the price of brass bars? Would it not be more honest to bring out these increases in costs? Against what? Just over 175 per cent. increase in charges.

Mr. L. Thomas: I am not going through all that; it is too late at night. I think I have made my point on the commercial approach. My final point follows on what the hon. Member has just said. In the light of the changed circumstances the increased requirement in these deficiency payments of £150 million visualises a heavier deficit next year and the year after than that envisaged for 1958, which was £85 million. A complete reappraisal of the whole structure is needed. I hope my right hon. Friend will give a general direction with a view, if necessary, to ensuring that there is a reduction in capital costs, but in any case a complete reappraisal of the whole modernisation plan, which itself will be overwhelming in the next twelve or fifteen years.

Mr. C. A. Howell: It is, perhaps, a tragedy that the discussion of an item of between £250 million and £400 million should come on so late at night, when everyone obviously has to curtail his remarks in deference to others who want to speak. Like the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr L. Thomas), one has to make part of a statement and cannot elaborate as much as one would like. It is probably one of the absurdities of legislation that we should have so little time to discuss so large an amount of money.
I am rather glad that the hon. Member for Canterbury came on to the commercial side of the matter before he finished his speech. Like him, I have been associated with railways—for thirty-six years. I was also very glad to hear him pay tribute to railwaymen.
He and I ought to pay tribute to railwaymen because both of us to some extent owe them a debt of gratitude and without them, for different reasons, we should not be here. On more than one occasion the Minister of Transport has paid tribute to railwaymen of Britain, particularly to their work in fog and snow. References have been made in the last fortnight to the dense snow we had in 1947.
Those tributes come like salt on the tongue of a railwayman, because we do not know what is to happen. I make no apology for coming back to the question of the Sunday newspaper article which was mentioned. I did not write the article. I have never written an article for any newspaper or periodical without attaching my name to it. I would never write one under a nom de plume.I have written many articles on railway work and they have been published in this country and abroad. I wrote many for the Railway Review,of which for a time I was a director, but I have never written for Modern Transport.This is the first time I have heard it suggested that Modern Transportwas not a responsible periodical, but we heard it suggested opposite that it was some figment of someone's imagination—

Mr. Gresham Cooke: Motor Transport,not Modern Transport.

Mr. L. Thomas: I said that the article in the Sunday Expresswas the figment of someone's imagination.

Mr. Howell: If I got it mixed up, I apologise. I hope that the hon. Members of the Transport Committee opposite will make perfectly clear and have published a repudiation in the same newspaper.

Sir F. Markham: Surely the hon. Member is well aware that repudiation has been made in this House half a dozen times and that the Sunday Expressnever prints categorical denials. The hon. Member ought not to repeat what is no more nor less than a damnable series of lies.

The Deputy-Chairman: Order. I think that we had better get back to the Bill.

Mr. Howell: I apologise, Sir Gordon. I will not return to that matter. We are discussing the extension of power to spend a lot more money. I want to come

back to the suspicion of men in the industry. They are entitled to be suspicious after the perpetration of acts by hon. Members opposite in siphoning off that part of the transport industry which is making a profit and leaving the railwayman with low wages to pay for the siphoning off. We cannot expect them to be anything else but suspicious. If they read in Motor Transportthat the Tory Party Transport Committee is considering ways in which they can siphon off some more to their friends, we cannot expect railwaymen to sit down and not say, as they did when the Minister of Transport agreed to setting up these boards, "Here is another batch of non-producers to be paid for."

Mr. Geoffrey Wilson: My hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) is the Chairman of that Transport Committee; I am the Vice-Chairman, and my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. L. Thomas) is the Secretary. We have all three denied in this House that the statement in the Sunday Expresswas an accurate statement of the views of the Conservative Party Transport Committee.

Mr. Howell: May I make it perfectly clear that I accept that. I hope that that is quite clear. I have said so in English that is as perfect as I, with my education, can make it.
What hon. Members opposite will not understand is that railwaymen who have contacted me, and with whom I have worked for thirty-six years, have heard this and have read it, and, naturally, they are suspicious. They are bound to be suspicious. They are suspicious of the Minister of Transport. I will admit that he is the best Minister of Transport that the party opposite has ever produced. I give him credit for that, and I have said so previously. I am not so bigotted in my political views as to withhold credit when I feel it should be given.
I wrote an article in the Railway-Reviewbitterly criticising the appointment of Sir Brian Robertson, but I withdrew that criticism subsequently when, in the course of my trade union career, I had to negotiate with the gentleman. I found that he is a jolly sight better railwayman than many others who had had the job, and he knew what he was talking about. I was primarily responsible for the railway strike in 1953, but


it was Sir Brian who stopped it. I give respect where it is due. But I do not think that Sir Brian Robertson or the Minister of Transport are fully conversant with what the Transport Commission is doing with this money.
My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough has referred to the reorganisation. If that has got to come out of this money—which immediately puts me in order, Sir Gordon—I want to tell the Minister that many Members on both sides of the House who have any association with the railways are inundated with protests. I refer to such places as Birmingham, Nottingham and Derby. To give an example, the control staff at Burton-on-Trent were moved to Birmingham. That meant uprooting their homes and buying new homes in Birmingham. Those people have now got to move from Birmingham to Derby. Some of the Derby people have got to move to Manchester and some have got to go to Nottingham. The whole section at Derby is to be closed and the people there are moving to Nottingham. Is that to be paid for out of these millions of pounds?
I will withdraw what I have said if the Minister or the Transport Commission can quote one railwayman, either in the traffic grades, the clerical grades, or the supervisory grades—anybody below an official at the top—who has said that in his opinion this can pay its way. Everyone says it cannot pay. It will waste thousands, if not millions, of this money and it will not put one wagon on the road again. It will not get one of us into King's Cross or St. Pancras ten minutes earlier. But it will cost a great deal of money. There is not a railwayman on the job who approves of it or has agreed with it, despite all the consultations which have been arranged in order to try and explain it.
11.30 p.m.
The hon. Gentleman the Member for Canterbury talked about being commercially-minded. It is the commercial side which is responsible for a great deal of the trouble. I am very apprehensive about what will happen to the other millions of pounds if the same attitude of mind prevails in the Transport Commission. The Commission is simply not commercially-minded. I interjected a comment at one point when the hon.
Gentleman was talking about disposing of the hotels. I was in some of the negotiations about certain of the hotels, and the Hotels Executive, as it then was, told us that these hotels were losing money. They were for ever likely to do so. I had to pay through the nose when I stayed at one during the negotiations. One never had decent service there, and they did not cater properly for the people there. But what happened when the Commission sold them? Managers were put in who would cater for the traffic that was there.
One hon. Gentleman said that this is not rail traffic. Of course it is not rail traffic, but this other traffic was there when the Transport Commission had the hotels but it did not cater for it. I am too old in the tooth to be told that anyone would buy hotels if he was not satisfied that he could make a commercial proposition out of them. If other people can make a commercial proposition out of them, so should the Transport Commission, either by putting in managers with a free hand to make them pay or taking off some of the red tape and letting the men there have a go, perhaps recruiting somebody who can do the job.
Let us commercialise the railways. The hon. Member for Canterbury was wrong again when he spoke about dieselisation, or modernisation—I am not sure which it was. I had a meeting with two line superintendents at Birmingham, one from the Western Region and one from the Midland Region. They said at that meeting that not one line was actually making a profit. They were making much more money, but not one of them was yet paying. Things may have changed in the few months since then; I do not know. The fact is that there are very many lines which are not profitable. That is why none of these unprofitable things would ever be siphoned off.
The Commission has cut down the traffic so that there are fewer trains to run. Presumably, we must have the same amount of traffic. Will this give decent comfort for the passengers? I will give the Minister one example. I hope he will forgive me if I do not mention the names and details, because the matter is at the moment sub judice,but I think I am entitled to give him an idea of the facts. A Sunday excursion was put on the main line. At the second stop, a rather large


station, the train was full. After it left, an irate passenger went to the guard's van and told the guard that he and his wife had first-class tickets but could not find first-class seats. The passenger said that he was convinced that there were second-class passengers riding in the first-class seats.
The first-class coach was the second coach from the engine and the guard's van was the eleventh. To placate the irate passenger, the guard, as a good, commercially-minded railway man, walked through the whole of that train, despite the fact that many people were standing in the corridors, to the first-class coach. He inquired politely whether all the passengers there held first-class tickets. Out of the whole coach, he found two passengers who had second-class tickets. He asked them if they would vacate their seats because there were first-class passengers standing, and they said that they would not; they were prepared to pay the first-class fare.
The hon. Member for Canterbury, who has had railway experience, knows that if passengers are prepared to pay, there is no one with authority to eject them. But what happened? The guard said, "I am sorry; I cannot turn them out, but, if you like, I will try and find two seats in the second class". Doing something which the Transport Commission will not issue an order for—I know this from correspondence with the Commission—he asked passengers in an adjacent compartment to lift the arms between the second-class seats and find two places for these two irate passengers.
Immediately afterwards the passenger wrote to the superintendent and said that the guard was guilty of a gross neglect of duty, first, for not turning out the second-class passengers and, secondly, for not taking the excess fare from them. That shows the ignorance of the public, whom the Transport Commission does not try to educate. The guard had no authority to turn out the passengers or to take their excess fare, because he would not know the charge and he would not have an excess fare book.
That illustrates the ignorance of the public and the lack of advertising by the Commission. This caused my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest

Davies) to make one of the same errors that many people make in London concerning the dispute on the Underground. He said that when a train stops at a station, people have a sit-down strike because, very often, it is a question of the economies affecting the train. My hon. Friend can correct me if I am wrong, but that was how I understood him.
Economies in transport are not made while a train is running. That is a question of the control and occupation of the line, what we call line occupation.

Mr. Ernest Davies: What I said was that one had suspicions that certain of the economies being made by London Transport were responsible for the greater inconvenience which the passengers are suffering. One instance was the uncoupling of trains. Today certain trains are not run all the way through to their destination because savings can be made if they are cut short. They are uncoupled at certain stations to save power and so on, and that is a result of the economies.

Mr. Howell: That is exactly what I thought my hon. Friend said, and I hope to convince him that he is wrong. These economies are not made whilst a train is running. If a train is to terminate at a different station for economy reasons the driver and the guard know when they start the journey and the destination will be given on the train, showing that it is going only to a certain point.
Changes are made only when, as a result of line occupation, a train in, say, the up direction becomes late, with the result that there are insufficient down trains to take all the traffic in that direction. Only a small explanation is needed to make the public understand. We can visualise what happens. A train has to go from the terminus at one end of the line to the terminus at the other end and then come back, or it must be turned back before it gets to the terminus. If it becomes so late in its running in the one direction that it cannot keep time and crowds of people are waiting to go in the opposite direction, obviously it is good railway business to pull the train out from the down direction and send it back in the up direction to take the waiting traffic.
My objection is that the Transport Commission does not try to tell the public what is happening. The best thing that the Minister could do is to hand this part


of transport over to the Milk Marketing Board. If it goes on much longer with its advertisements with the little lions and has film stars to advertise for it, we shall soon be egg-bound, as the railways are becoming fog-bound. [An HON. MEMBER: "Egg bound, or milk bound?"]. I should have said the Egg Marketing Board. I apologise for getting mixed up.
Apart from advertising the excursions, the Commission gives the impression to the public that it could not care less. That is not the way to get the confidence of the people. I cannot recall a time since the nationalisation of railways when the Commission's prestige has been as low as it is now. It may be that the London Transport sit-down strikes are making matters worse. It may be that the elimination by the Commission of certain trains which people have used for years upsets the public, but I have been on sufficient committees concerned with the closure of branch lines to realise that the Commission does not tell the people why these things are necessary in the same way as it shows pictures to explain, for example, the Barking reorganisation, what it is intended to do and its progress.
The hon. Member for Canterbury has spoken about it being impossible to make an appointment with less than half-an-hour's margin for trains from the North Kent coast. Passengers blame the staff, and people travelling on the Underground also have been blaming the staff. I submit, however, that they are blaming the wrong people. It is the management who should be blamed. When people are delayed the first thought is often to take it out on the staff; the reaction is to take it out of the man on the job. I would prefer that the public wrote to the Commission, although I have seen letters claiming that it is no use complaining to the Commission because all one gets in return is a plausible apology.
The Minister has a responsibility. He has told my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-on-Tyne, West (Mr. Popplewell) that he cannot give directives to the Commission about which priorities it should choose. The Commission is responsible to the Minister, who has only to indicate what it is he wants, and I hope that after tonight's discussion he will say to the Commission, "You have a job to do and, if you do not want to

alienate the good will of the passenger, then you must give a better explanation about delays than are given now. "Instead of spending millions of pounds on reorganising the railwaymen. I suggest that it would be much better if the Commission reorganised its commercial and advertising departments.

Mr. Watkinson: The whole House must be very grateful to the Chair for having allowed so wide a debate on this Clause, but it is, I think, in lieu of a debate on Third Reading.
I will try as quickly as I can to traverse the ground which has been covered tonight, and I would say at the outset that perhaps the most important matter raised was that by the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) on the question of the "break-even point." The reappraisal of the Commission of what is needed—carried out with the help of some of its customers—will take account of that fact. I think that the Commission has been wise to have views expressed by the Federation of British Industries, the Chambers of Commerce, the National Union of Manufacturers, and so on, but it was foreseen when we introduced the original Transport (Borrowing Powers) Act that to look ahead for a number of years was something which would give flexibility to the terminal date and to the terms of repayment.
Perhaps the House has forgotten that the terms of repayment were left in a flexible state. The amount of repayment up to the seventh year was a matter left to the Commission, with power to make a token repayment if it was thought that that was all it could do, and at the end of the seventh year, after the initial repayment at the Commission's discretion, the matter was left with the Ministry and the Treasury to decide.

Mr. Ernest Davies: The right hon. Gentleman says that the Commission had to make a token repayment up to the seventh year. Is that correct?

Mr. Watkinson: Yes; and this whole question of repayments was deliberately left in a flexible way in the sense that the matter could be looked at in the light of developing circumstances. There was never any attempt to lay down an arbitrary system of repayment. The date 1961–62 was not selected by the Government.
11.45 p.m.
It was a duty put forward by the Commission, as part of its prospectus on which the House advances it very large sums of money, to cover its deficits until it thought it would reach its break-even point. It is also fair to the Commission to say that up to the end of 1957 it was on target, and it is only the drop in coal and steel contracts—which certainly in the case of steel will come back—that has put the Commission out on the basis on which it said it would break even in 1961–62.
I do not think it is for me to be optimistic or pessimistic at this point, but it is for me to tell the House that the forecasts made by the Chairman when he wrote to me as to the final outturn of 1958 have been remarkably accurate. They have not been falsified by events. Indeed, they have been almost exactly right. As the House will recollect, we took steps to ensure that there is not a loss to competition. Indeed, the Commission is winning more of the coal traffic that is available. Perhaps it is a sidelight, as my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. L. Thomas) said, that, as most hon. Members know, the gain which oil had over coal was after the price of coal had been raised to a high level, which made oil more attractive. Perhaps there is a lesson there for the railways. With the coming of the motor car and intense competition, one can price oneself out of the market only too easily today.
As I said, however, it is not my job to be either optimistic or pessimistic about the future. It is for the Commission to forecast about its future. It is only fair to say that for the passenger side, in the latter part of 1958, against the corresponding periods in 1957, the figures are, for example, for the four weeks to 7th September, 1958, ·5 million up on the previous year, for the four weeks ending 5th October 6 million, for the four weeks to 2nd November ·3 million, and then ·1 million up for the four weeks ending 30th November, and 1·8 million up for the four weeks up to 28th December. In other words, on the passenger side, where modernisation has had its first impact, there is a definite and ascertainable improvement. Whether that will hold next year or what the position will be is not

for me to say, but the Commission's own gauge has been so far the basis for the Government's financial arrangements and it remains. If it comes to a need for a reappraisal, it is up to the Commission to tell the Government and the country, but that position has not been reached yet.
Perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury will allow me to discuss long-term finance at an earlier hour some other time, which I should be happy to do; but on the general issue whether the Commission is becoming overburdened, although I do not entirely accept his view that it is bankrupt, it is certainly in the hands of its bankers, meaning the Government. But this is a business with a £750 million turnover a year. Therefore, it should not be alarming to us if we find ourselves talking in rather big figures when we discuss its present and future.
It is the Commission's own wish, as it is the Government's wish, that as it is in the hands of the country, which is really its bankers, it should be subject to stiff financial discipline. This is not some form of bullying the Commission. It is the Commission's wish, as it is the Government's, and, indeed, I think the wish of all sensible people, that in that situation the Commission should have firm financial discipline as the spur to get itself out of its difficulties by its own efforts. It is only right and honest.
Unpunctuality worries us all and does affect the financial position. One cannot go through a vast electrifying and modernisation plan and keep an exact scale of punctuality. It may be that the Commission would have been wiser—it is the business of the Commission and not mine—to have altered its timetables to less exacting schedules. However, that is a matter for the Commission. The reason for the unpunctuality, nevertheless, is the modernisation plan itself. Absolute punctuality figures as quoted by the hon. Member for Enfield, East are not an entirely fair test. If those long-distance trains which are five or ten minutes late are disregarded, the figures of unpunctuality are materially reduced.
There are economies which hon. Members are fond of criticising as being things which prevent the Commission doing what it wishes to do. Hon. Members with those views should read the


modernisation plan again. They will see that this cutting down was always part of the plan. All we are doing is to ask the Commission, and the Commission has agreed, to do it more quickly. This pruning away of the railway services, this narrowing down of the front, is not some new idea suddenly thought up by the Government. It is part of the original modernisation plan produced by the Commission itself. All the Commission is doing is trying to do it more quickly. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. C. Howell) for his compliment which was—

Mr. D. Jones: May I interrupt?

Mr. Watkinson: No, not until I have finished my argument— nearer the truth. It is absolute nonsense to say that any of the difficulties with the Underground or with the railway services as a whole are due to cuts in capital expenditure. The fact is, in the words of the Chairman of the Commission himself, at the moment the Commission has all the capital money it can use.
I am dealing with two matters; first, the economies are those laid down in the original modernisation plan and are not some new idea suddenly thought up; secondly, deficiencies in services, whether Underground or railways, are nothing to do with the fact that the Commission has had its capital investment cut. The reverse is true. The Commission, it says, has all the capital investment which it can use at present. There is therefore no reason for saying that the Commission's task has been made more difficult. On the contrary, I am amazed at the ingratitude of hon. Members opposite for the fact that these large sums, which politically could be more easily spent on roads, for example, are still being put into the railways so that the railways should have every chance to give a properly efficient and modern service.

Mr. Ernest Davies: The Minister must have misunderstood some of the argument from this side of the Committee. It was never suggested that the cuts in capital expenditure were affecting the operations of British Railways or London Transport. My argument was that the economies being forced on London Transport made it cut down its services. Those are the economies affecting

services. Nobody has suggested that it is a matter of capital expenditure, which we support.

Mr. Watkinson: I am very glad to hear it, but no economies have been forced on London Transport. London Transport is responsible to the British Transport Commission, not to me. Planned economies are things which London Transport settles with the Commission and not with me or any other member of the Government.

Mr. Lindgren: May I interrupt?

Mr. Watkinson: No, not until I have finished my argument.
The difficulties on the bus services are entirely due to the departure of the customer after the bus strike. That is the hard fact in that case, as I said at the time.

Mr. Lindgren: Will not the right hon. Gentleman agree that as a result of agreement after wage negotiations last May, resulting in an increase in costs of 3 per cent., the Commission had to achieve certain economies? Did not the achievement of those economies have a certain effect on efficiency?

Mr. D. Jones: The right hon. Gentleman said that the contraction of the railway system was nothing to do with him; it was a matter for the Commission. But did he not say during the Second Reading debate that he was asking the Chairman of the Commission to increase the £20 million saving that the Commission seeks to make in 1959, in spite of the fact that it has already saved the £3 million which it said it would in the document entitled "Proposals for Railways"? The Chairman of the Commission admits in his letter to the Minister that it has saved, in economies, £6 million of the wages increase earlier last year and that it hopes, in addition, to save a further £20 million in 1959 by contraction. In the Second Reading debate the Minister said he was asking the Commission to raise that to £30 million. Is not that contracting?

Mr. Watkinson: That is quite so; that is exactly what I said. All I am asking the Commission to do is to achieve a great deal more quickly than originally envisaged the contraction in the industry set out in the modernisation plan. Nobody who has studied the situation from an


unbiased point of view has ever said anything else but that the future of the railways lies in a much smaller, much more efficient, and much more modern system. Those people who oppose that are doing the greatest possible disservice to the railwaymen that it is possible for anybody to do.
I will sum up by saying that I am glad that the Opposition are not opposing the Bill, because on its provisions for modernisation rests the whole hope of railwaymen for the future. Any railwayman who believes in his job—as they all do—accepts that as true, and I am glad to hear from the hon. Member for Enfield, East, that hon. Members opposite accept that the Government are doing a very good job in providing this very large sum of capital to try to put the railways on their feet.
We argued out the question of deficit financing in the Second Reading debate, and I would only add that if in the early years after the last war this House had been worrying about modernisation instead of nationalisation, a great deal of the present difficulty would not have arisen.
I would sum up the difference in our respective approach by saying that we hear a lot about monopoly and subsidy from hon. Members opposite, but I want to make it quite plain that the Government believe that the consumer should have the right to choose the kind of transport which he thinks best fits his needs and cuts his costs. The Opposition believe the State should dictate that choice for him. We reject that entirely, and we believe that we are doing the very best we can as a Government to put the railways on their feet and to make them into a modern, efficient and streamlined service, and the very best for the sake of the country and the men who work so selflessly for the railways. I am glad that the Bill will be passed, because it is a necessary step to that desirable end.

Mr. D. Jones: I would not have intervened if it were not for the cheap political gibe which the Minister made towards the end of his speech. It does not behove the right hon. Gentleman to talk about nationalising or modernising the railways in the years from 1945 to 1950. I would remind him that his Government have been in power since 1951.

We are now in 1959, nearly eight years later. In the first year following the end of the war, when the railways were privately owned, their deficit was more than £ 60 million. In the years of war, when the control was on, the Government reaped nearly £250 million in excess charges on the railways, made by carrying Government traffic, it is true. The railwaymen suffered as a consequence.
The Minister now says that what the House should have engaged in in 1945 was the modernisation of the railways. Either he speaks with his tongue in his cheek or he does not appreciate what the economic circumstances of this country were in 1945. If the railways had not been nationalised in 1947 the modernisation programme at present would not have been possible.
12 midnight.
I do not want to detain Members by repeating some of the figures my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) gave on Second Reading, but we know the kind of return which in the years before the war when the railways were allowed to decay the shareholders got, and we know the kind of conditions in which the railwaymen worked in the years immediately before the war. When the war was over the restitution of the economic life of this country was of fundamental importance, and to bring the railways under public ownership was the only possible means of modernising them.
If the question is about modernising them between 1945 and 1950, will the right hon. Gentleman say what the Conservative Government were doing between 1951 and 1955? It ill behoves him to make that kind of gibe at the end of his speech, when he himself is a member of the party which has been in Government since 1951. Since that time the deficits of the railways have got worse with each successive year. The right hon. Gentleman told us once that what he was seeking to do in the Ministry was to inject the best principles of private ownership into this nationalised industry. Did he mean by that an increasing deficit each year until seven years after his party took power the railways were £85 million in the red? Of that, £13 million is entirely due to the


economic policy which has been pursued by the right hon. Gentleman's Government. It ill becomes him, even at this late hour, to make that gibe.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Bill reported, without Amendment; read the Third time and passed.

NUCLEAR POWER STATIONS (SAFETY)

Motion made, and Question proposed.That this House do now adjourn.—[Colonel J. H. Harrison.]

12.2 a.m.

Mr. Goronwy Roberts: The matter I wish to raise tonight is one of transcendent importance to every man, woman and child in this country, and, indeed, to the human race, namely, the hazards which are created by nuclear fission. Let me say, at the outset, that I am not raising this matter in an alarmist spirit. My whole intention is to give the Government, through the Minister, an opportunity of placing the whole matter in proper perspective. There is an abundance of data on this question, but it is remarkable how inconclusive it is and how contradictory the expert interpretations of this data can be, and it is to the Government that we must turn for final authority. In this matter, above all others, they have the duty of clarity.
The matter is of particular interest and concern to us in North-West Wales for two reasons: first, the projected building of two nuclear power generating stations in the area; and, secondly, there have been recent reports that the incidence of strontium 90 in the area is far higher than the average for the country and that it is increasing.
Let me take the question of the nuclear power stations first. Clearly, the hazard which they notionally present is quite different in origin and in controllability from the other kind of danger. In common with the great majority of the people of the area, I have very strongly welcomed the intention to build these two stations, as my hon. Friend the Member for Merioneth (Mr. T. W. Jones) has done. One of them is now being built

in Trawsfynydd, in Merioneth, and we very much hope to see the second go up in Edern, in Caernarvonshire, in my constituency. We regard them as examples of a new, beneficial industry of the future which will provide constructive employment in an area at the head of the queue which is waiting for work.
My own view, not one reached hastily but after considerable inquiry and study, is that such installations are at least as safe for the workers and local population as most other industries. That is my view. There are, however, fears expressed in some quarters that such establishments constitute a fearful hazard. To clarify the position, I should like to put a number of questions to the Minister. The Windscale mishap is widely quoted by critics of these stations. Is it correct to say that that kind of accident is not technically possible in the type of reactor which is projected in the Trawsfynydd installation and the other new stations?
Secondly, there are suggestions that those stations are subject to seepage or leakage of radioactive matter which could adversely affect the health and safety of human beings, animals in the locality and also of vegetation. What truth is there in that? Is it correct to say that what leakage there may be is so small as practically to be harmless?
Thirdly, can the Minister reassure us about the disposal of radioactive waste? What method of disposal will be adopted with regard to an inland station like Trawsfynydd and to a coastal station like the one projected at Edern, and will the results be harmless to the population, agriculture and fisheries in the area?
I turn to the second part of the inquiry I made. The reason we want the maximum assurance about the safety of the stations is that, after all, they are to be built in an area where the intake of strontium 90 is as a result of nuclear explosions throughout the world is already higher than in the country generally. It is quite well known that parts of Wales, like parts of Cumberland, Scotland and other districts in the United Kingdom, show a greater intake of this substance as a result of the fall-out from nuclear explosions.
This factor, naturally, has attracted the anxious attention of some of the foremost scientists. I call to mind two outstanding


Welsh scientists who, very properly, have made a special study of these peculiar conditions in Wales, Dr. Glyn Phillips, of Cardiff University College, and Dr. Eirwen Gwynn, of Criccieth, both of whom have written ably and responsibly about these hazards.
Recently, the Medical Officer of Health for the Borough of Caernarvon and the rural district of Gwyrfai—also a Dr. Phillips, Dr. E. A. Phillips—presented a report to those two local authorities in which he explained how in areas of high rainfall like North-West Wales the rate of deposition of strontium 90 on the ground and on foliage is very much higher than in other areas. He says that it may be passed to humans through their intake of water, milk, vegetables and meat. He further points out that both the soil and the drinking water of this area are deficient in calcium for which strontium 90 is a hideous and intrusive substitute.
The medical officer of health gives figures to show what the position is. I will quote only a selection tonight, contenting myself with sending to the Minister the officer's full report. Recent tests of drinking water in North-West Wales have shown that the radioactivity in terms of strontium 90 micro-curies per litre was 5·6 and 5·2. These figures are equivalent to 7 per cent. of the international maximum permitted limits for radioactivity in drinking water, and, expressed as the maximum permitted limit for Thames water, this would be 28. The report also quotes figures showing that the extent of strontium 90 detected in humans, animals and vegetation in these areas is considerably higher than in others, and there are suggestive facts about the indication in such areas of peculiarly dreaded diseases.
The question is what conclusions should we draw from these figures. I sometimes think that ten times practically nothing is still practically nothing, but there is need for greater clarity and precision as between the Government and the general public, and perhaps officers in various departments of the public service. These figures certainly provide grounds for concern. My question is: do they provide grounds for alarm? Are the Government alarmed? We think that the official interpretation of these figures should be made absolutely clear, and I

join with my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins), who has most advisedly been pressing the Prime Minister to make the position clear in terms which the average layman can understand.
What the medical officer of health in question has done is simply to draw attention to the facts. Very wisely and responsibly he and the authorities whom he serves have refrained from interpreting them. We feel that the burden of interpretation is on the Government, and I hope tonight that the Minister can put the whole matter in clear perspective so that we may avoid both complacency and alarmism in this vital matter.
There are one or two specific questions on this matter of area susceptibility to strontium 90 which I will put as briefly as I can. First, what is the hazard that faces these areas of high rainfall and low calcium? Can it be defined and measured? Secondly, is there now an authoritative assessment of the true safety level of absorption of these substances? Thirdly, we know that tests for radioactivity in humans, animals and vegetation are now carried on in three places in Wales—in Talgarth, Cwm Ystwyth and Lake Vyrnwy. Should not these tests be conducted in other parts of Wales and, indeed, in the United Kingdom, and proper records kept?
In sum, what we seek tonight is: first. a reassurance—which I think the Minister can give—about the safety of these new nuclear stations; and, secondly, an expression of a sense of perspective and clarity in regard to the position in what are now known as the susceptible areas in the United Kingdom.

12.15 a.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Power (Sir Ian Horobin): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. G. Roberts) for raising this matter. He will agree that at this late hour and in the small amount of time available I cannot go into great detail. Fortunately, there will be an opportunity very shortly, when the Government present the Nuclear Installations (Licensing and Insurance) Bill, to go into these matters more thoroughly.
I will, if I may, cover in reverse order the two heads of the hon. Gentlemen's


questions. I will take the one he puts second first because it is a little more complicated than the one about the nuclear stations themselves. This is, of course, a highly technical matter, and I do not pretend to be a medical expert upon it. Fortunately, there is more or less general agreement between the Medical Research Council, the body which is the principal adviser of the Government on this matter and which is of the highest standing, and the United Nations Scientific Committee which has issued a Report, which the hon. Gentleman may have seen.
I think that it is fair to say that a good many of those who have been in the opposition, if I may put it that way— I will not say alarmist—have been people who, while they are, in many cases, scientists of very great eminence in other fields, are not, by and large, working in this particular field.
Speaking as a layman, as the hon. Gentleman asked me to do, I would say that the first point we should be clear about in understanding the situation is that these radioactive isotopes— strontium 90, caæium, iodine, and one or two others—all have physical half-lives. Some die away faster than others, strontium in a matter of years, some of the others in minutes. What is more important, and, perhaps, not so widely realised, is that there is a biological half-life, too. The whole body is perpetually renewing itself. Even the bone structure is changing, and, therefore, the rate of elimination of these things from the human body is faster, and the equilibrium level to which they build up is very much lower than would otherwise be the case. Not only is that so, but— and this is very important—there is, as it were, a series of filters through which these things go.
To take radioactive strontium in particular, what happens is that it is washed down from the stratosphere and goes on to the ground. Only a small proportion of what goes on the ground comes up in the grass, and only a small proportion of what comes up in the grass goes through the cow and comes out in milk. Speaking in very general terms, it is only about one-sixth. Only a small proportion of what goes into the human body with the milk goes into the bone, and that is what matters.
I will take a case which, at least at the beginning, is very well known to the hon. Gentleman. In Cwm Ystwyth, strontium units of radiation—I will come to that unit of measurement in a moment —of between 120 and 180 have been stated to occur. But the maximum coming out in the milk of the cow is about 30. The equilibrium level for the build-up of that in the bone would be between five and six. It is, therefore, very important that the public should have clearly in mind that measurements of what is, so to speak, lying about, though I do not say they are irrelevant, do grossly exaggerate the risk.
Next, we should be clear that measurements of strontium units can lead to a great deal of confusion. Even the Medical Officer of Health for the Borough of Caernarvon is reported to have stated that he was under the impression, although he may have been wrongly reported, that the radioactive danger in drinking water, for instance, could be measured in terms of these so-called strontium units. Of course, they are quite inappropriate for that purpose.
I can illustrate the absurdity of using them, which might cause alarm, in this way. They are related to measuring the relation of radioactive strontium to calcium which the body takes in, because that is how they start building up in our bones. If we were to put all the drinking water in this part of Wales through a perfect softener, so that there was no calcium whatever in the water, measured in strontium units it would be infinite, but we would not have increased the radioactive strontium that the body was taking in. There would be no difference whatever in the danger to health in drinking it. I assure the hon. Member that, in fact, the best evidence we have is that he could go on drinking this water for ever without its having the slightest effect on his health.
The next thing which I should like to make quite clear is the truth about the increase in the amount of radioactive strontium which is coming down on us from the stratosphere. It is true that it is increasing. It is not true that the rate of fall is, by and large, increasing. The best advice we can get is that if it went on falling at its present rate for several generations the equilibrium level at which it would build up in the bones


of the population would still be well within what I might call the "amber" band. That is not when it becomes definitely dangerous, but the period when, as the Medical Research Council said, definite action would be called for. The best analogy would be the amber light and not the red light.
If the present rate of increase went on for two or three generations, it would still correspond to an equilibrium level in the bones of the general population which, while not necessarily being desirable, would be well within only the warning limit and not rise to a level of serious danger. Of course, without going into the politics of tests, and so on, it would be a very depressing prospect if we were to go on doing tests of this kind for the next sixty or one hundred years.
I ought to say a word, in passing, on the question of leukaemia. I am advised that this rare disease is a cancer of the blood; it sounds peculiarly unpleasant, but it is a very rare disease. It is true that it is increasing, but, to show the difficulty of the problem, the increase began a generation before the first tests. It had been increasing for about thirty years before strontium 90 began descending upon us. Not only that, but the rate of increase did not show any particular jump when this outfall of strontium from the stratosphere began. That is a curious thing, but there are many curious things in biology.
The second thing that we should bear in mind and which can give us some reassurance is that in a rare thing of this sort, one must be very careful with statistics. It is possible to get absurd figures of percentage increases when dealing with ratios of about one in 1 million. I am, however, advised that there are at present no statistically significant differences, either by area or in time, in the incidence of this disease.
So much for the general picture of the hazards from fall-out. Admittedly, it is increasing, but it is far below any danger level, and all the indications are that it is likely to remain so. There is no need for alarm.

Mr. J. Idwal Jones: May I ask whether it has been established that there is no connection between the incidence of leukaemia in North-West

Wales, and the fall of strontium 90 in that area?

Sir I. Horobin: There is no statistical difference between North Wales and other parts of the United Kingdom. It is like trying to find out the number of people who die through being kicked by a horse; there is no statistical significance. I am advised that it is within the margin of error. There is an increase of leukaemia, but that has been going on for a long time and it is no indication of any need for alarm.
Against this background, we have to think of the area where, because of extra rainfall, for example, more of this radio-strontium descends on to the ground and two, or certainly one, nuclear power station is to be built. In normal operation —and I am speaking with extreme brevity —I am able to assure the hon. Gentleman that there are certain radioactive substances which may go up the stack, but they are of such short life that they can be ignored. Seepage has been referred to, and I think that that, too, can be ignored.
There may be circumstances in which portions of coolants might be released, but the monitoring is done with such extreme care and there are definite arrangements which in due course will, no doubt, be turned into legislative arrangements to ensure that radioactive effluent is most carefuly controlled. The short answer is that in normal operation there are few branches of British industry that take such intense care to see what is going on; few branches where there is such care to see that what is going on is properly controlled.
The second matter with which we are concerned is the possibility of accidents, and here there is a different position from that concerned with the ordinary fallout of strontium. Nobody suggests that there will be a series of accidents in any one of these plants, so we have to think of what the maximum temporary emission of radioactive substances is. It is here that it is important to remember why the Windscale accident is irrelevant to this matter. It must be pointed out that no damage to health was done to anybody by the Windscale mishap. It was unnecessary, we believe, to have dumped all that milk, but we were being extra careful.
The Windscale accident took place as a result of the release of Wigner energy, but that type of release will not be necessary in the new stations. The second reason is that the coolant was air. Uranium burns in air, although it does not burn at anything like the same temperature in carbon-dioxide, which is the coolant in power stations. The coolant at Windscale was also an open system and the air went up the stack. Anything radioactive went up with it, but at Trawsfynydd and other stations, there is to be a closed system, and the carbon-dioxide does not go outside the system. It is in a very carefully tested circuit,

so that there would have to be extraordinary circumstances for large quantities to leave the system.
I can reassure the hon. Member. I hope to have the opportunity of saying more on this subject at a later stage, but he will be doing a good service to his constituents if he assures them that Britain is in the forefront not only in constructional ingenuity, but in safety devices in this field.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-nine minutes to One o'clock.